INDIA CAN EMERGE AS A THIRD POLE

THE DAYS OF A UNIPOLAR WORLD ORDER ARE OVER, AND WE ARE ON THE CUSP OF A GENUINELY MULTILATERAL ONE. INDIA HAS A UNIQUE OPPORTUNITY TO PROJECT ITSELF AS A TRULY INDEPENDENT GLOBAL POWER

- KISHORE MAHBUBANI

India is entering its best geopolitical sweet spot since its independence 75 years ago. What is the geopolitical sweet spot? It's the opportunity for India to position itself as the world's only truly independent global power.

What has created this geopolitical sweet spot? The simple answer is that the world is experiencing one of the greatest geopolitical shifts ever seen in human history. We are finally moving away from the unipolar world order to a genuinely multipolar, multi-civilisational and, consequently, multilateral world order. Geopolitical shifts create opportunities. They also create dangers.

This major structural shift is, of course, triggered by the re-emergence of China. This is a perfectly natural development. From the year 1 to 1820, the two largest economies were those of China and India. The past 200 aberrant years of Western domination of world history are finally ending. Since the return of China, India and much of Asia has been facilitated by the absorption of Western ideas and best practices, the West should welcome this. In theory, it does. In practice, it does not.

Behaving like all other great powers in human history, the US is making a major, last-ditch effort to preserve its number one position in the world. Even though it denies it has mounted a "containment" policy against China, seasoned and respected western observers like Edward Luce of the Financial Times and Ian Bremmer of the Eurasia Group have confirmed that "containment" has begun. In Cold War I against the then USSR, India found itself on the "wrong side" and paid a price for it. Today, some Indian thinkers believe that India is now on the "right side". Hence, a strong and powerful constituency has developed in the Indian community of strategic thinkers, arguing forcefully that India should align itself with the US and make the QUAD-rather than BRICS-the number one pillar of Indian foreign policy.