The Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) is a biennial summit held
every two years in one of the Commonwealth nations. Commonwealth nations are the
nations that were formerly colonies of the British Empire. Only two, Rwanda and
Mozambique are the members that have no British colonial history and have joined
recently. This year it was held in United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland from
19 to 20 April. This was the Twenty-fifth meeting of the head of the governments of these
nations. The chair of the meet was Ms. Theresa May, the Prime Minister of UK. The agenda
of the summit was ‘Towards a Common Future’ under which Britain had elaborated upon
the discussion of four main goals: prosperity, security, fairness and sustainability.
If one looks at the history of India’s role at the Commonwealth, one will conclude that India
did not play a major role and did not take great interest in the Commonwealth, even when
the first PM, Shri Jawaharlal Nehru emphasized upon the affiliation to it despite criticisms
from various people and political parties. J. Nehru felt the affiliation will be economically and
politically very important to connect and link with the western powers, in spite of the
prevalence of Cold War and India’s stance of non-alignment. It is believed that because of
the stance of India joining it, even the then USSR (until Korean Crisis of 1950) never
showed keen interests and enthusiasm in having relations with India. Despite this, India’s
internal policies and inward economic inclination, kept it away from the forum to meet its
interests and needs. Even after the end of Cold War, India shifted its interests from the
forum and tried strengthening its ties with US and started to develop means to tackle a two-
front threat from China and Pakistan.
After a long gap where India had hardly shown any keen interests in a forum like this, India
has now renewed its interests and has actively started taking part in it. India now feels that
since her national interests are rising, to meet these interests it is very important and
necessary that it be a part of many multilateral organizations, associations, forums, etc. and
renewal of her interests in the Commonwealth was because of this. With this enthusiasm,
India, under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi stepped into the meeting,
which had some takeaways for India.
This meeting was important as it was the first meeting after Britain had exited the European
Union. There was a landmark agreement over cyber security, and UK agreed to give 15
million pounds to help Commonwealth nations to improve and strengthen their cyber
security capabilities and India, too agreed, to take an action on it by the year 2020. There
was also a strong agreement on the multilateral trading systems and the nations signed a
six-point agreement over connectivity that would boost the trade an investment. Also this
summit saw an agreement for cooperation over protection of oceans from three main
things: climate change, pollution and over fishing, among others.
Apart from the agreements that took place between the 53 nations that were participating,
India held bilateral talks with various nations to strengthen its ties and revive some of its old
friendships. Mr. Modi and his Bangladeshi counterpart, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, held
talks on improving cooperation on important issues. Mr. Modi also met the President of
Seychelles, Mr. Faure and discussed co-operation which is necessary in trade and some
other bilateral issues. “This was significant as Seychelles has very recently ordered an
inquiry into the leak of a classified agreement signed with India which was to develop
infrastructure on Assumption Island, which is southwest of mainland Mahe”, quoted a
newspaper named Jagran Josh. He held several other bilateral talks with other member-
nations and reiterated upon the importance of maritime cooperation.
India announced that it was willing to contribute to the funds for the development and
capacity building projects for the member-nations. India also agreed to contribute for the
Commonwealth smaller state offices that have been set up in New York and Geneva
respectively, and has agreed to train 30 boys and 30 girls for Cricket which will be taken up
by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).
Overall India has now looked upon fulfilling its national interest by adopting leadership skills
in a forum that doesn’t include China. India has reiterated its leadership and importance at
various points of time in South Asia and the Indian Ocean region. With this conference
concluding, India was at a benefit, as it was able to improve its ties with important countries
like UK, Australia, etc, was able to swiftly deal with the countries it had bilateral issues with,
and agreed to help other developing member-nations with funds. With this India has tried to
provide some leadership to make the Commonwealth an effective forum again and has an
excellent chance to shape a model for international cooperation and partnership.
India has in time recognized the importance of being part of a forum that does not include China. Most of the countries in the commonwealth nations are strategic allies for India. By taking part actively in such forums will create the needed buffer and balance against the Chinese ambitions, especially the alarming developments in both our northern and southern borders.
I completely agree with you. India needs to now be a part of those forums where it can assert its leadership skills, and forums that do not have China, are the only ones. But calling all the Commonwealth nations as an ally of India is incorrect. India considers everyone to be its equal partners. In the time of needs, very few nations would actually help India. Look at Britain for example, they only helped us in the 1962 Indo-China war, providing us with small weapons. But on all other occasions they put economic sanctions on us. It is only with time, that we will actually come to know who our real ally is. Pakistan, another Commonwealth nation aren’t on a good terms with us. Other Commonwealth nations do provide some strategic resources and locations that India can use to curb China’s growing influence in South Asia.