Brics in Rio is an opportunity for New Delhi

India should play a leading role at the summit in Brazil, along with other major countries of the South, in guiding the bloc

- Pankaj Saran

Within a span of three weeks, India would have straddled two worlds and two realities of the G7 and Brics groupings. The seamless progression of India as a systemically important economy, vital for global economic health and courted by all sides is a reality that has now come to be accepted as the new norm.

The forthcoming visit to Brazil by Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi for the 17th Brics Summit will be his second successive visit to the western hemisphere in these weeks, but the contrast between the outings is striking. At the G7 Summit in Canada, India was on the outside, yet to be baptised as an equal. In the other, India is a founder and insider. One will be a State visit, embellished with the award of the country's highest civilian honour for foreign nationals. The other had a tentative touch to it. Neither the spectre of a tense political relationship with the host government nor of anti-Indian demonstrations by separatist groups nor the irritation of unsolicited offers of mediation between India and Pakistan hang upon the PM’s visit to Brazil. Indeed, the air is more relaxed.

What, however, does cast a shadow over the Brazil Brics Summit is the persona of President Donald Trump. In February this year, the US President called Brics dead, and threatened its members with suspension of trade with the US or hundred percent tariffs if Brics moved towards an alternative currency challenging the dollar’s hegemony. In this way, he positioned Brics as being against US interests. His message was clear but so has been the message from the unprecedented expansion of Brics.