QUAD and BRICS both seek INDIA
Since Galwan episode, the World has woken Up to the fact that India is capable of looking after its interest on its own. Therefore Japan, the United States and Australia see India as the key member of Quad for the obvious reason of countering China. However India does see the need to counter or deter China unnecessarily. Only problem between them is proper demarcation of Indo Tibet border and Tibet China border. Once these are done then other issues can be settled with talks and negotiations. Therefore India also sees a purpose in engaging quite intensively with China through other existing frameworks like BRIC.
Everyone has also been aware since Russia’s conflict with Ukraine on February 24, that India follows its own independent foreign policy. Yes, India imports a lot of military items from Russia but so it does from other countries. However India is not dependent on any one country, any one thinking on this line is simply making a huge mistake. For that matter India is not dependent on USA also.
Russia may be China’s “strategic partner,” but then it is India’s “ strategic” friend also for military supplies. So naturally India has refused to join in any Western sanctions or condemnations of Russia’s conflict with Ukraine. A joint statement between Russia and China in February this year about that strategic partnership, moreover, talks of an aim of deepening collaboration between those two countries and India.
So now botnothe Quad and the BRICS, the two rivals, are competing with each other as they find India one of its key members among the countries. BRICS, members are Brazil, Russia, China, South Africa – and India and the QUAD see India as the key member for the obvious reason of countering China.
Tokyo recently hosted the “Quad”. The leaders of Japan, the United States, India and Australia had met at all is quite an achievement, especially when one of the key members, India, is taking a stance on Russia’s war on Ukraine so different from that of the others.
India had abstained from voting on the UN Security Council resolution over Ukraine.
At first, the BRICS summits appeared to symbolize the growing importance of these big emerging economies, reflecting also in a Western-centric sort of way the fact that the idea of “the BRICS” was originally created by a British chief economist at the American investment bank Goldman Sachs as an intellectual piece of marketing, according to Asia Times.
As compared with the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, the BRICS summits look almost technical in nature. The Quad was initiated by Shinzo Abe in 2007 with the idea of influencing or reshaping the grand stage of geopolitics, using joint military exercises between the four countries as a way to emphasize the Quad’s role as a counterweight in the Indo-Pacific against China’s growing role.
The quite intense annual program of BRICS ministerial meetings and other events shows that even if this grouping is largely ignored by the international media, it nevertheless has established quite a strong habit and necessity of consultation and collaboration among the five member countries.
