Abstract
India and Taiwan share relations predating to 1947. The relationship between the two was on hibernation for three decades. There are many hindrances to India-Taiwan Strategic Engagements and the most important is India’s adherence to one China policy. India-Taiwan shares many similarities, and the Look East Policy of India has opened a new window of opportunities between the two countries in terms of strategic engagements. This discussion paper takes a review of Indo-Taiwan relations in the last three decades and suggests the roadmap for future engagements between the two countries.
Key Words – Indian Ocean Region, INDO-Taiwan Relations, Strategic Engagements
Introduction
India –Taiwan relations have a long history since the 1930s. India established official ties with the People's Republic of China in 1950 and, was supportive of its stand that it was the only state that could be recognized as "China" and that the island of Taiwan was a part of Chinese territory. These initiatives affected the Taiwan-India relations for more than four decades.
In the year 1991, India adopted the “Look East Policy” to boost India's trade and investment relations with the Southeast Asian neighbors. The economic crisis of 1991 forced India to establish contact with Taiwan. This contact was in the form of high-level but unofficial visits to Taiwan for exploring economic opportunities and scout FDI for India. These efforts resulted in two countries establishing representative offices in each other’s capitals in 1995.
Recently Indo-Taiwan relations pick-up the momentum due to the New Southbound policy initiated in 2016 by President Tsai to have wider engagement with potential allies, partners and friends. Through the policy, Taiwan has comprehensive engagement with Australia, New Zealand, India, and its five South Asian neighbors. (India’s Act East Policy played a role of catalysts in INDO-Taiwan relations. Of course, SINO-India relations dominated the strategic partnership between India and Taiwan but in recent years with a border dispute with China resulting in tensions in Doklam 2017and Galwan 2020, compelled India to re-think its policy on Strategic Engagements with Taiwan. The INDO-Taiwan partnership is equally beneficial in several aspects. It will be a missed opportunity for both Taiwan and India if the two sides do not find a way to engage each other purposefully.[2]
Post-199, India’s economic reforms with the Look East policy opened many channels of cooperation with Taiwan. In 2000, Taiwan included India, in an expansion programme of the Taiwan government’s Go South policy. In 2002, Vincent Chen, the first Taiwanese scholar to spend three months at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) in New Delhi as a Visiting Fellow. Similarly, Andrew Chou was the first active service officer who visited the IDSA and stayed for about the same duration. From India K. Santhanam, the then Director-General of the IDSA visited Taiwan during this period. In 2003, China Airlines started a direct flight between New Delhi and Taipei establishing direct air contact between Taiwan and India (Singh Prashant Kumar 2014)[1]
The current discussion paper reviews INDO-Taiwan Relations from 1991 to 2005 and 2006 to date and suggests the framework for future India-Taiwan strategic Engagements.
India- Taiwan Relations – A Discussion
The bilateral relations between the two countries were established in the 1930s when Shri. Jawaharlal Nehru visited China in 1939 as an honored guest of the ROC government. The relations further developed with the Visit of Chiang Kai-shek and his wife Song Meiling to India in 1942. The relations between the two countries faded subsequently due to India’s recognition to PRC in 1950 and recognizing the island of Taiwan was a part of Chinese territory. Post-1991 India not only experienced the economic crisis but also witnessed the collapse of the USSR with whom it had trade and economic ties. To leverage its position in the dynamic Asia-Pacific region, the Look East Policy was useful so to be part of an economic hub that was emerging in the Asia-Pacific region and in particular East and South East Asia. The regional economies of Asia Pacific were an attractive source of foreign direct investment (FDI) for India. The growing economies of East and South East Asia could be India’s future export markets. In order to search for markets and investment, the Look East Policy unveiled by Prime Minister PV Rao, provided the launch-pad. Prime Minister PV Rao overturned India’s longstanding reticence to dealing with ASEAN and actively sought closer links with Japan, the Republic of Korea, Taiwan, and member nations of ASEAN.3 The emphasis of the Look East Policy (LEP) was to build bridges with countries such as Japan, the Republic of Korea, Taiwan, and the member countries of ASEAN so to stabilize India’s external economic profile and accelerate the rate of economic growth. The changes in Indian foreign policy post-1991 were defined by economic development and to reintegrate into the world economy. The inclusion of Taiwan in LEP was important from India’s point of view was important concerning the political and security concerns about China. In 1995, India established unofficial ties with Taiwan and since 1991 it had many engagements with Taiwan as mentioned in Table No. 1
Taiwan reciprocated with its go south policy to establish links with India around the year 2000 as it included India in its expansive program. Since then many initiatives were undertaken by both countries to improve people to people contact between them. The Act East Policy of India proved to be a catalyst in improving the bilateral relations with Taiwan. The “Act East Policy” was launched in November 2014 by the Prime Minister Shri. Narendra Modi, India’s “Act East Policy” is an upgrade of the “Look East Policy”. Act East Policy focuses on the extended neighborhood in the Asia Pacific Region. The policy is a diplomatic initiative to promote economic, strategic and cultural relations with the vast Asia-Pacific region at different levels and involves intensive and continuous engagement with Southeast Asian countries in the field of connectivity, trade, culture, Defence and people-to-people-contact at bilateral, regional and multilateral levels. It further aims to strengthen the economic development of the North-eastern Region (NER) to promote economic cooperation, cultural ties, and develop a strategic relationship with countries in the Indo-pacific region. There are 4C’s of Act East Policy: Commerce, Connectivity, and Capacity Building & Culture. Along with 4C’s, the important dimension of Act-East Policy includes the dimension of ‘Security’. Table No. 2 lists the measures taken by both countries to improve relations further.
Vijay Gokhale, the then director-general of the India-Taipei Association emphasized that despite having a no political interactions, the economic interactions between India and Taiwan are based on the idea that Taiwan needs a market to grow, and India can be such a market. (Ting-I Tsai 2016)9 The mutual need may drive future strategic engagements between India and Taiwan. Though the distance between Mumbai and Taipei is more than 5,000 kilometers, but on any digital maps, these cities are neighbors. The region between the two countries is of utmost importance. 80 percent of the seaborne oil, one-third of the LNG and more than 50 percent of the world’s maritime trade passes through the region which separates India and Taiwan. It is very important that the two countries shall have a mutual association through strategic engagement so to strengthen the relations between the two countries. Table No. 3 indicates a brief comparison of economic indicators pertaining to both countries India and Taiwan. It explains the closer engagements between the two countries with strong economic and financial fundamentals. Such engagements prove to be productive in longer duration considering the big Indian market and high-end Technology available with Taiwan.
The India- Taiwan relations are discussed in a lesser extent, in spite of being economically and industrial developed countries with many synergies to be exploited. In the light of above discussion, it is important that a common framework shall be evolving so to take Indo-Taiwan strategic engagement to next level.
Conclusions
The Cooperation and Harmonization efforts between the two countries India and Taiwan may result into addressing the strategic issues which were hidden under the table for long. A new chapter between the two countries will not only unfolds but also create many opportunities in different sectors to progress together in the coming decades. In order to initiate the bilateral strategic engagements, this paper propose a common mutual framework between the two so to make sustainable strategic engagement in the forthcoming years
The MAITRI-Model provides a common framework for the sustainable INDO-Taiwan Strategic Engagement in the suggested areas where both countries share a common interest. The model is sustainable as it would augment each other’s competitive and comparative advantage so to get maximum mutual benefit. The common areas of the MAITRI Model is elaborated in Table No. 5
The common framework for mutual strategic engagement such as MAITRI-Model would be useful in strategic engagement between India and Taiwan. It would also encourage people to people contact, enhance the current trade and beneficial in Academic Exchange and Technology Transfer.
The Indian Economy aims to achieve the target of 5 trillion USD-United States Dollar mark by 2025 while Taiwan will surely pass 1 trillion USD - United States Dollar mark by then. Though the current trade between the two is 7 billion USD, it is promised to grow in coming years. Hence it is imperative for both the economies to work jointly under a common framework so to enhance trade and economic activities and to develop sustainable long-term association through strategic engagements.
References
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4 https://idsa.in/system/files/monograph35.pdfRetrieved February 19, 2022
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8 https://www.roc-taiwan.org/in_en/post/39.htmlRetrieved February 19, 2022
9 Ting-I Tsai (2016), “For Taiwan, India's in the slightly-less-hard basket”, Retrieved February 19, 2022, from Asiatimes Online -https://web.archive.org/web/20060222171729/http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China_Business/HB15Cb02.html
10 Yan Ho (2012), “Taiwan Yacht industry: A tale of two entrepreneurial firms”, in Chen Simon, Yan Ho and Yu Fu (eds), “The Making of Taiwan’s Economic Miracle”, Global research Publications, New Delhi p.-85-109
11 https://www.moea.gov.tw/MNS/doit_e/content/Content.aspx?menu_id=20964Retrieved March 9, 2022
