Explanation: Debt-trap diplomacy is a theory that describes a powerful lending country or institution seeking to saddle a borrowing nation with enormous debt so as to increase its leverage over it.

• Debt-trap diplomacy was associated with Indian academic Brahma Chellaney, who promoted the term in early 2017.
• To gain rapid political and economic ascendency across the globe, China is dispensing billions of dollars in the form of concessional loans to developing countries, mostly for their large-scale infrastructure projects.
• These developing nations, which are primarily low- or middle-income countries, are unable to keep up with the repayments, and Beijing then gets a chance to demand concessions or advantages in exchange for debt relief.

Source: FORUMIAS