New Delhi and Tokyo: Asia’s new leaders: 

New Delhi and Tokyo: Asia’s new leaders: 

Context

• The India-Japan relationship is rapidly gathering momentum, taking shape faster than any of India’s other current strategic partnerships
• Changing Trend between India and Japan
• Post 2016 annual summit, the partnership between India and Japan began to take a bolder tone and approach to the changing security environment
• Japan and India, today are beginning to outline a framework to shape and lead the region.
• Today, the two countries clearly see each other much more strategically  and realize the importance of shaping Asia’s architecture promoting its growth, development, and stability. Earlier it was based only on economic terms
• Both the countries have moved towards exploring the possibilities of collaborating on projects in third countries.
• Recently India and Japan,  took a step forward with the launch of the “Japan-India Coordination Forum for Development of Northeastern Region”.
• This is perhaps the only dedicated forum between India and a foreign government on the development of the northeast—a region that physically connects India to southeast Asia
• India and Japan also share a regional view in the Indian Ocean and beyond.

What caused this positive transition?

• One of the fundamental reason for this growing understanding is – connectivity.
• New Delhi is perhaps one of the sharpest and loudest critics of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
• Japan was the first country to come out in India’s support during the Doklam standoff.
• Apart from development on the domestic front, such as the inauguration of the Ahmedabad-Mumbai high-speed rail project, India and Japan are now projecting this partnership at a regional level, beginning in South Asia, expanding into the Indian Ocean and onwards to Africa.
• Where India struggled to meet its domestic requirements on infrastructure development, it is now outlining regional strategic connectivity and infrastructure investments in partnership with Japan.

2016 Annual Summit was the initiation point

• In 2016, Japan had talked about a “free and open Indo-Pacific strategy” in Kenya
• The joint statement post the 2016 annual summit laid the ground for a broad Indo-Japanese vision for the Indo-Pacific.
• The two leaders discussed the strategy and announced their intention to build a maritime corridor connecting Asia and Africa.
• The idea was simple: to provide seamless connectivity between the two continents with immense infrastructure and commercial potential.
• The pace of developments since these announcements have been rapid and significant given the technicalities in bureaucratic negotiations.
• The 2016 summit also saw the leaders underlining their intent to enhance connectivity in northeast India, develop “smart islands” and joint collaboration in the port of Chabahar.

2017 Summit as the Next Step Forward

• The 2017 summit significantly advanced the initiative to develop the northeast which shares international borders with China, Bangladesh and Myanmar, with a territory contested by China (Arunachal Pradesh).
• While the idea of building smart islands is interpreted as developing India’s sensitive Andaman and Nicobar Islands, any real commitments are yet to be seen.

What does these new improvements imply?

• The 2017 summit though reinforces Indo-Japanese commitment for developing smart islands to boost connectivity.
• India’s decision to engage Japan in the northeast underlines its pragmatism and a shift toward a bolder foreign policy engagement.
• There is unmatched intent and willingness in the Indo-Japanese relationship to collaborate on new areas and across the region.

Joint Effort to handle China

• India and Japan realise their limitations in competing with China-led initiatives.
• However, Beijing’s assertive behaviour, both at sea and its continental border with India, created a platform for deeper collaboration between India and its partners.
• India and Japan realize the need to act on the changing security dynamics to secure their interests and strategic ambitions.
• Instead of competing with China’s ambitious commercial activities backed by unrivalled capital, India and Japan began creating an alternative narrative—aiming at stabilizing the region in times of uncertainty.

What should both the countries do, to take forward the partnership?

• Having outlined the vision and intent, India and Japan will now have to consolidate their economic engagements and expand strategic partnership with specific projects, goals and deliverables.
• The key will be in maintaining the steam in this relationship. The bureaucracy on both sides will have to tap into this political will to implement and realize the initiatives that have been laid out.
• The partnership must identify infrastructure projects in countries like Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Bangladesh in the Bay of Bengal
• India and Japan must also deepen their trilateral relationships with the US, Australia and France to shape the security architecture consistent with their vision and goals