Published in Malaysia's Star newspaperSunday December 11, 2005
India eager to make presence felt at summit
BY A. LETCHUMANAN
INDIA is set to make its presence felt at its talks with Asean leaders in Kuala Lumpur beginning tomorrow.
And with its status as one of the world’s growing economic powers, trade would undoubtedly top the agenda.
Narayan: ‘Lots of possibilities for intensified cooperation between India and Asean’
It is thus not surprising that one of the main issues at the Asean-India Summit on Tuesday will be the finalising of the Free Trade Agreement.
The agreement would boost trade and economic relations between India and Asean, said Indian High Commissioner to Malaysia R.L. Narayan.
He said India was also turning towards Asean due to the dynamism of the regional grouping market economy.
“We see lots of possibilities for intensified cooperation between India and Asean. Traditionally, India has had cordial ties with Asean,” he said.
Malaysia is special to India for a reason – Malaysia has the largest number of people of Indian origin outside the Indian subcontinent.
Narayan said that since India first embarked on its “Look East” policy almost a decade ago, seeking institutional links with Asean and East Asia, significant gains had been achieved.
Between 1993 and 2003, Asean-India bilateral trade grew at an annual rate of 11.22%, from US$2.9bil (RM10.73bil) in 1993 to US$12.1bil (RM 44.74bil) in 2003, with the figure reaching US$20bil (RM74bil) last year.
Asean-India cooperation has deepened and broadened, encompassing trade, investment, tourism, human resource development, science and technology, people-to-people contact, health, transport, infrastructure, small and medium-scale enterprises, information and communication technology (ICT), and agriculture.
He said India had outlined special programmes, including a US$200mil (RM740mil) credit line for the CLMV countries – Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam – as well as setting up entrepreneurship development centres.
Narayan said India was eager to make its presence felt in the East Asia Summit, by contributing fresh ideas.
Manmohan: Had often reiterated India’s view of the present century being an Asian-driven one.
“It is very fitting that the first summit is realised and hosted by Malaysia, which mooted the East Asian community idea,’’ he added.
He said India was participating in the East Asia Summit on the basis of its close co-operation with Asean countries.
Narayan said Manmohan Singh, India’s former Finance Minister, had often reiterated India’s view of the present century being an Asian-driven one, due to the multiple poles of economic growth in Asean, China, India, Japan and South Korea.
“These are all high-growth economies. We think it is time, as stressed by Prime Minister Manmohan during the last summit in Vientiane, that we should talk in terms of an Asean economic community which would enable all to realise the potential and reap the gains collectively from the dynamics of the region,” he said.
Manmohan, speaking at an economic summit in New Delhi last month, said India was committed to bringing down its tariff levels to that of Asean’s level.
“We are on the verge of entering into an FTA with the Asean countries and are certain that in the next few years, we may see the rise of a major free trade area in Asia covering all major Asian economies, including China, Japan and South Korea, and possibly extending to Australia and New Zealand,’’ he had said.
On India-Malaysia trade, Narayan said it was expected to rise to about US$4.6bil (RM17.02bil) this year, an increase from last year’s US$4.3bil (RM15.91bil). Malaysia is India’s largest trading partner within Asean.
He said Malaysian companies were involved In India in highway projects, building urban townships, housing development and airport privatisation, including the building of the Hyderabad Airport.
Narayan said the tourism market was also growing with about 116,000 Indians having visited Malaysia in the first six months of the year, adding that this was expected to reach 250,000 by the year-end.
Last year, 172,000 Indians visited Malaysia.