India’s Pivot to China & RICFive Strategic Dilemmas

0:02 [Music] Welcome to conversations. I'm Mtad Khan and today I'm going to talk to you about what is happening with Indian foreign policy. There's a clear turn, a pivot towards China and towards Russia. Is India trying to revive uh the old uh proposed idea of a potential non-western alliance of ra that is Russia, India and China or India is planning to essentially work with China uh to also strengthen bricks eventually because India is going to be the chairman of the

0:47 bricks uh grouping next year and uh the bricks summit the next bricks summit is going to be hosted in India. India. Uh and now Prime Minister Modi has announced that he's going to be attending the Shangai Cooperation Organizations summit he will be attending where after 7 years Prime Minister Modi will be visiting China and he will get to meet uh the president of China Xi Jinping. Russia is also a member a founding member of SEO. in fact one of the two driving forces uh behind SEO Shangai Cooperation Organization and so we don't know yet but it is possible that even Putin will be there so we might get to

1:32 see a photo op of RAIC Russia India China Putin uh Modi and Xi Jinping so this these are the developments today the Chinese foreign minister Wongi met Prime Minister Modi initially There was no indication that he was going to meet according to his schedule he was meeting Dr. Jay Shankr on Monday and he was going to meet Ajit Doel on Tuesday and uh but apparently Modi took time off to meet with him just as Xi Jinping had met with Jay Shankar when he was visiting uh last month for the Shangai Cooperation Organization's foreign ministers meeting. Uh the tweet that Prime Minister Modi sent out after

2:17 meeting Wong Yi is nearly were batting the same as what Dr. Jay Shanker said after his meeting uh at the SEO especially after his meeting with Wongi and when he met with the vice president of China. Uh so I'm going to read out the Twitter. I'm I'm new to this platform. So, I'm still learning how to do this live streaming. And as you those of you who saw me do the first one this afternoon, you must have noticed that I have learned how to uh use uh the intro. So, I hopefully I would have been able to show this. But anyway, I'm going to read out to you uh what uh Prime Minister Modi said. He said, "Glad to meet Foreign Minister Wong Yi. Since my meeting with President Xi in Kazan last

3:04 year, which was in October, India China relations have made steady progress guided by respect for each other's interests and sensitivities." This is an interesting word. Uh it was used quite a bit by J. Shankar also uh in his opening remarks to Wong Yi. Uh mutual sensitivity, mutual interest and mutual respect is what Dr. Janker was talking about. Uh he says, "We have made steady progress guided by respect for each other's interests and sensitivities. I look forward to our next meeting in Tanzhin on the sidelines of the SEO summit. Stable, predictable, constructive ties between India and China will contribute significantly to regional as well as global peace and prosperity. So I want to draw your attention to this particular statement

3:51 that uh the Indian ministers foreign ministry uh uh Indian foreign minister and Dr. Jay Shankar and now Modi is making that since my meeting with presidency since the meeting of Modi and Xi Jinping in Kazan that was in October 2024 there has been apparently a steady improvement of India China relations. Now as you all know and as I have pointed it out before that's not true. The Indian foreign ministry is suddenly suffering from amnesia. China in in May during operation Sindur uh when India attacked Pakistan's uh terrorist camps in Pakistan and then

4:37 subsequently there was a 4day military engagement between India and Pakistan. China stood firmly with Pakistan. China provided real-time assistance to Pakistan. Most of the weapons that Pakistan was using against India were made in China, supplied in China. In fact, uh because there was a gap between the terrorist attack in Pahelgam and India's retaliation or India's attack on Pakistan uh even though India was threatening military action. uh uh we we know that weapons were transferred from China to Pakistan just before operation Synindur started. But not only that, after operation Sindur, uh China has

5:23 supported Pakistan diplomatically at the UN Security Council, at the IMF, at the World Bank and at FATF. Uh so so in many ways, China has been standing very firmly with Pakistan. uh just May this is June July August just three months ago so how can both Dr. Jay Shankar and Prime Minister Modi said the Chinese don't say that the Chinese don't say that our relations have been steadily improving or to that extent the kind of statement Wong made was that it is in the interest of both these countries to be allies rather than competitors uh to work together rather than work against each other. And so China is talking about looking forward going forward and having good relations

6:10 with India. But India is trying to project it backwards to say that things have been improving because I guess once again Prime Minister Modi just as he denied any role of the United States in uh the ceasefire between India and Pakistan. He wants to I guess deny any role to the US in this India's change in foreign policy, India's pivot to China. Uh so the apparently the relationshipship has been getting better. Clearly India did make an effort. There's no doubt about it. The meeting in Kazan would not have happened if India didn't want to meet if Modi didn't want to meet Xi Jinping. And prior to that, prior to October 2024, if you remember, a lot of us did shows on the topic as to how suddenly India was

6:57 okay with what China had done on the border. And so at first, India was saying there was no normalization on the border and then and saying that we will not have normal relations with China unless there's norm normalization in border. basically saying we need to go back uh to pre galwan attack that was in in 2020. So unless we went back to the pre- galwan attack uh status there would be no uh moving forward but then India changed its position uh to enable Modi to meet with Xi Jinping in Kazan and suddenly everything was okay on the border even though I mean the the troops are there nearly 50,000 Chinese and 50,000 Indian troops at least and

7:43 they're continuing to build uh so so they are moving forward uh uh and we will see how how things go. Uh but the deescalation has not yet happened. In fact, the meeting between uh Ajit Do and Wongi was about uh the military uh infrastructure that both sides are building on the border near Galwan and about de or deescalating the troops that is you take away some of the troops from the border. We will see what that happens. So it is in this context that there suddenly seems to be an interest and the question is being raised whether India is pivoting towards Russia and China and away from the west or or or what is it that is going on. So

8:31 it is in this context I mean I will leave it to Dr. Jay Shanka to articulate whether uh there is uh any fundamental shifts in Indian foreign policy. Uh unfortunately these days he's become like a broken record. He says the same thing again and again and again and again. Even though there's no correspondence with reality that oh this is we live in a multipolar world and uh India is a one of those polls and we want to maintain our strategic autonomy and so on and so forth. Well you could have maintained your strategic autonomy last year too and and had good relations with Russia and China but you tried to undermine both SEO and bricks. India has been uh a kind of a a negative influence inside bricks and SEO for the past 2

9:17 three years and then suddenly now it wants to strengthen the core of bricks which is RIC Russia India China. So anyway so there are five strategic questions that I think this India's pivot towards China raises. Number one, why is RAIC so important? Why is Russia, India, China an important pivot? I actually did did a show some time back about a month ago. Sergey Lavrov, the foreign minister of Russia in the March in March of 2025 suggested that it was time for Russia, India and China to to once again meet in a trilateral dialogue and revive the mechanism of RAIC.

10:02 uh that was an important part point that Sergey Lavrov made and then subsequently there was all this talk about reviving in India Russia uh summits. So there has been no India Russia summit I think since 2020 u for the last 5 years obviously India has been steadily moving towards the west away from Russia away from China about six seven years ago India uh procured 70% of its uh weapons from Russia now India has cut that in half to 35% now China uh now France and Israel and the United States contribute uh the rest of India India's weapons acquisition. So India has been moving towards the west significantly in the

10:47 past four five years partly driven by Galwan partly to get western uh alliances and partnerships especially through quad. Uh India was getting very close to the United States. Every other month we would see Blinken and Dr. J Shankar meeting or Ajit Do coming uh and meeting um the national security advisor here and then they would come up with all these is all these alphab alphabets with CT IC this that quad and so there was all these constant uh talking of various collaborations between the US and India and there was no similar announcements of any kind of collaborations with Russia or China or anything else or even

11:33 with Brazil or South Africa. So you can't see any parallel uh instances of so much of collaboration that India and the US were showing until very recently. So the question now is that why is India taking the initiative to revive RAIC? Today, Prime Minister Modi met with Wong Yi and today J. Shankar is in Moscow uh to revive the India Russia summit. So, it's it's it's an interesting day diplomatically speaking that J. Shanker is in Moscow today. Uh Wongi is in Delhi today. So, you can see the RAIC connection here. uh the reason why I

12:19 think RIC is very important is that first of all it would be a non-western partnership comprehensive strategic alliance whatever you want to call you can call it that but the second thing is I I can see that a lot of you are making comments uh once I finish my presentation then I'll be happy to read your comments and comment upon them or answer any of your questions if there are so if you look at the top 10 economies after making an adjustment for purchasing power parity. So once you make an adjustment for PPP see without PPP the biggest economy in the world is the US the second biggest is um China followed by Germany, Japan then India

13:07 and then Great Britain in the sixth position. uh so in in the top six position itself you see uh four G7 countries uh and only two BRICS countries but if you make an adjustment for purchasing power parity you will see that the biggest economy in the world today is China at $40 trillion followed by the US at $30 trillion followed by India at 17 trillion and then Russia at the $7 trillion. So today if you do an a PPP uh adjustment for Russia then Russia is the fourth biggest economy in the world is bigger than Germany and Japan uh based on the purchasing power parody. So if you look at the top four economies

13:52 then it is US and RAIC China US India Russia. So in the top four economies today, RAIC and the US. But if you also look at the power index, world power index, which are the most powerful countries in the world militarily speaking, the rankings are US number one, Russia number two, China number three, India number four. And so even in the top four military powers, it is RAIC and the US G7 comes afterwards. So in that sense because RIC are 23 or are one 134 and 234 when it

14:39 comes to power and econ economy it becomes a very powerful alliance if it can partner if they can become an alliance they're not allies China and India are not allies they're competitors very hostile till till last week Russia and China are not partners or They don't have a strategic understanding. Whatever their understanding is informal and the same with India and Russia. India doesn't have a formal partnership with Russia. In fact, India has had more strategic partnership with the US in the past few years than with Russia. So the question is yes on paper ra looks very powerful but can it actually realize plus you must remember the US is still India's

15:25 biggest trading partner unless Donald Trump keeps those 50% tariffs for an extended period of time one or two years then that the India US trade is going to take a big hit and then there will be many countries that will overtake the total amount of trade between India and US but until then US is the biggest trading partner. Not only that, it is strategic partner too. So would would India be willing to sacrifice this for whatever it can get from China and Russia? Russia now has a great hope. Putin after meeting with Trump, he must be very optimistic about getting a good deal out of Ukraine. If the war stops, the first thing that he would want to do is end sanctions.

16:10 So the number one goal for Putin after ending the war would be to move towards the west, not away from the west. He wants to bandwagon, not balance the west. He wants to go open trade with Germany, with all the Europeans. He wants to sell his gas. The pipeline is already there. He just needs to turn it on and he will be back and prosperous and within 5 years ready to attack Ukraine again. So for Russia I think if there is ceasefire Russia's first priority will be to try to make amends with the west not form an alliance with India and China against the west and the same is true with China. China has been so careful. Xi Jinping not going to the

16:56 bricks summit was because exactly at that time China was having intense negotiations with the US on trade and and the the insider uh uh chatter is that Xi Jinping didn't really want to basically upset uh Putin unnecessarily by going to the brick summit that's why he didn't go there so the first dilemma is do or I see Russia, India, China want to come together without going towards the west but if they all say we are all going to practice strategic autonomy then all of them head back towards the US India will find it a bit difficult

17:43 under Trump now but as soon as Trump's presidency is over then India can restore its strategic comprehensive strategic partnership with the US so the First dilemma is that are RIC themselves interested in forming an alliance which will be seen as hostile or anti- west uh to protect each other from the dictatorships of the western uh power. If you remember when I saw the meeting that was taking place in the white house there were no Asian powers in that meeting at all. They were irrelevant to what white house decided yesterday. a major war that has been fought in this century, three and a half years, and Asian powers have nothing to say. Neither Japan nor China nor India were at at the White House table. Trump

18:30 didn't feel the need to invite them in the so-called multipolar world. But if there's any major conflict in the Asian theater, America will be all over it and so will European countries like the case of Taiwan, like the case of Operation Synindur. So that's the first dilemma. The second dilemma is can bricks really stand up to the west and that is is is a big question. Like I said uh there is a lot of seduction from the west. Who does China sell everything after Assean? The second biggest market is Europe and the third biggest market is is the is the US. China's exports to the

19:17 US are $650 billion and it's exports to to to Europe are also in that same range. China is not going to lose or want to have bad relations with a segment of the world to which it sells more than a trillion dollars worth of goods. more than a trillion dollars worth of trade. China's trade with Russia is $129 billion. Total is 240. China's exports were 129. Total 240 and with India about 150. So it's about $400 billion with Russia and China. But with with Europe and the US it is nearly four times that.

20:04 The same with Russia. I think Russia will be very tempted to get back into West would like to be part of G8 which was abolished after uh the the Georgia conflict and uh the same with India. I think if you have a pro- India or not so pro- India also a new president I think India will definitely try to get back uh to its normal relations with the US as they because they've been developed over 25 years. started with Clinton and so on. Every presidency including the first term of of Donald Trump, India's relationship with uh US has been nurtured.

20:50 The third question which is a strategic question for India is is India moving away from the US towards China and Russia or is India being pushed away. Now you may say think that it is just semantics but I don't think it is semantics. It's very important. If India is being pushed away, that means that at least to this US administration, India is strategically not as important as the previous administration thought it was. And therefore, India is being pushed away. And so India because it is being pushed away from the west is moving

21:36 towards Russia and China uh to kind of get back at the US and try to find basically partners who can help it balance because India doesn't want to be isolated um if its relations with America continue to deteriorate. So that is the third question is India being pushed away or is India moving away? If India is moving away, it shows that India has more autonomy. But if India is being pushed away, then it shows that India does not have autonomy. Uh my fourth question and this is also for India is will Russia and China treat India as its equal

22:23 in the RAIC. India has made a big deal about wanting to be treated equally which is not the case even in the US. Okay. You didn't see American president come running to India after Modi got elected in 2024. But you could see how Modi wanted to rush to Washington try to be the first person to meet with Donald Trump after he became president. They were coming, all these world leaders were coming to Washington to pay homage to Donald Trump. It didn't happen the other way around. So the relationship was not of equals. It was one power patronizing the other power to use it against the third power.

23:12 But now will Russia and China treat India as equals? I don't think that's going to happen with China. In principle, I think India and China should find a way to be friends because it is to their advantage. It is good for Asia if China and India are not aligned against each other. But will China just treat India as okay now that you have come back uh after dumping the US. We are so thrilled that you'll be with us one. I'm not very sure. China has its own agenda. China wants to expand bricks. India has tried to block it. China has heavy investments in CPAC. It is now extending CPAC from Pakistan to Afghanistan to Iran. It has huge investments in Bangladesh, in Sri

23:58 Lanka, in Maldes where it is competing with India. So will India continue to compete with China in the bricks or will it cooperate with China and be not bricks sorry uh the belt and road initiative BarR will India compete with Barri or will India join Barri that is the next question that I would like to ask uh I mean that is the question that I would be having in my mind if I was with Wongi in India that is the key question yes he may Say it out loud but that is a question. When do we ask India to join the bel and roll initiative? Already India is planning to reduce uh the barriers that it had constructed for

24:44 Chinese investments. So you could look forward to more Chinese investments and will they come outside the belt and road initiative or will it be part of the belt and road initiative? So this is uh uh the the next question uh to ask uh and my last question for India is is India's relations with China a better India having close relations with China and upsetting the US is that a better situation for India strategically than India having good relations with the US and upsetting China as it was last year. That is the strategic

25:30 dilemma. The fifth strategic dilemma is India having good relations with China and not so good relations with the US better for India or India having good relations with the US, not so good relations with China. I think in the long run India having good relations with China is a much better proposition than India having good relations with the United States because the direction in which the US is going is not a happy direction. The US is becoming xenophobic. It is becoming selectively isolationist has become very aggressive. It is not respecting international law. I mean now while the bilateral between Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin is being

26:18 planned, they're having trouble finding countries where Putin can go without getting arrested, but he could come to the US. I mean, criminals can come to the US frequently. Netanyahu comes here all the time. He's wanted. He can't go to Europe now. So, the US is not even respecting international law anymore. does not respect international law, bullies international institutions, bullies other countries, etc. So, in the short run, yes, under as long as Donald Trump is president, uh, Xi Jinping is a much better dictator to be friendly with than Donald Trump. But, India needs to actually do some scenario building and see what happens to the United States after Donald Trump in

27:06 2020. the next elections are going to be in 2029 and so what will happen in the 2029 elections and then going for or 2028 elections going forward what will happen so those are the five dilemmas that I think uh are going to be triggered uh as a result of India's now leaning towards China and Russia and leaning away from the United States and I can tell you that the US India cannot India will not be able to have good relations with Europe Europe while having bad relations with the US. Eventually um the Europeans will stand with the US. Uh they will try to have strategic autonomy but they cannot. So those are the points that I wanted to share and so

27:52 now I'll be happy to see if there are interesting questions and then I will answer them. Patel Ratwick you were the first to come. Good morning to you Patel. Uh namaskar Dr. Khan Sahib. Uh this is Milind. Hello Milind. How are you doing? Uh uh Arian Singh, you take everything Modi says literally. No, I don't take everything that he says literally. He says he's non-biological. Apparently, he's not human. I don't take that seriously at all. uh Mayang Sharma, India and China resolve border issues soon and closely work in many areas in the future. Well, we will see that's the plan, right? Uh the border issue,

28:40 India has an urgency to to to go close to China. China is sitting very happy. Uh China was in a happy position last week with regards to the US. It's in a happy position now. So, China has no urgency to become friendly with India. India is an opportunity for China to add to its collection of belt and road initiatives etc. China is building client states and it has an opportunity to make India a client state but India is different. India wants to get closer to China because it has lots of problems with the US. India is on the rebound. China is not. And so for India, India will have to decide and say okay we can overlook these problems on the border. I don't think China China is going to make

29:26 any concessions on the border to India right now given the position that China is. I think it will demand that India make concessions. We will see once the details unfortunately this government is not very open and does not share information. So, but I'm sure that the information will leak out anyway if there is any compromise. But they will have to make compromises otherwise they can't go forward. Oh, okay. I will try to do that. Volume should be high. Thank you, Bilal. Uh Girhar Pande, the moment India stands, I see Trump wiped out. I don't know what that means. Why is India sitting? Why is India sitting? And I don't know what you mean. If you

30:12 think India becomes a major power, India is a $4 trillion economy. The US is a $30 trillion economy. India is expected to catch up by 2075. But that is just Goldman Sachs Sachs prediction. Uh but we don't know what's going to happen in the next 50 years. And if if India stands up in 50 years, Donald Trump will probably be long dead and gone. So, I don't know what that really means. Uh uh I don't know. Samir, hello Samir. How are you sir?

30:59 Good morning sir. Modi or Yogiji? Hello. Uh they are trying their best uh Samir they are trying their best definitely um I had an interesting meeting uh a few days ago with somebody who is uh a consultant who advising Adityanat Yogi to bring in foreign investments into Uttar Pradesh. Uttar Pradesh is one of the poorest states in India. In fact, there are like I showed a few days ago, there are about four states in India which are poorer than Pakistan and UP is one of them. And because UP's population is so high, it really brings India down. So, so for example, Telangana is as

31:44 developed as Ukraine whereas uh UP is like Afghanistan which is worse than Pakistan in developmental levels. So this guy was trying to advise Aditya Yogi to focus on basically told him drop all these Hindu Muslim stuff mand thing that you do and focus on uh development creating jobs bringing foreign investments there are a lot of potential in UP manpower I mean weak labor yeah look at uh when I went to Hyderabad a few months ago all the the labor class were from Bihar and so you can invest them why you why you going away to to to so far away to do just manual labor. If there are investments in UP and other

32:31 places in the region, there can be good jobs, better lives. So he was telling me that he's been working with Adjitan Yogi for a while and he has seen no progress of him moving away. I mean they think that after 1,000 years they've got a chance to make India Hindu ashtra. So they want to pursue that. That I think is more important to them. That's why they're undermining Nehu, undermining Gandhi and pro projecting Saukar. Look at the speech that Prime Minister Modi gave uh on Independence Day praising RSS. What a shame. RSS was played no role in India's independence struggle. I know they will rewrite history or make some stupid Bollywood film which everyone will assume is the truth. I'm sure they're soon going to make a movie

33:16 in which India got independence only because of RSS and Gandhi and Nehu and Malanad nothing to do and then most of the Indian people are going to believe that but in reality RSS did not play any role uh in the Indian independence movement and on independence day from Lal Kila Modi was praising the contributions of RSS. So yeah, those are not secular intentions or tendencies. Uh Hormone Quest, how are you? The way Trump respects Russian and Chinese leaders, why don't you expect accept that there is at least triple polarity? I don't know. Triple I mean we could argue that there is a bipolar system, but go back and look at the Russia,

34:02 Soviet Union and US geopolitical competition. That was a bipolar movement and look at the kind of war that you're seeing in West Bank and Gaza would not have happened if the Soviet Union was there. So, China is not playing China is a bigger economy than Soviet Union ever was. But China is geopolitically not confronting or challenging the US or the West the way the Soviet Union did. uh and uh Russia, I mean Russia is struggling to beat a country Ukraine whose GDP per capita is $5,000 compared to say Germany's which is 5,500. The West has not sent troops, has not sent their best weapons. No offensive weapons have been sent by the US

34:50 uh and uh and they just keep giving some defensive weapons and Ukraine is fighting on against Russia. Russia is just a $2 trillion economy. Yes, when you're just for purchasing power, it becomes $7 trillion and becomes a big economy. But still it is $7 trillion. Anuraga second question is is the question that everybody should be talking about in India. Can India develop at nobody came and said, "Oh, India has just allocated $7.5 billion to build its own air force." Yeah, but where are the engines coming from? Are they buying from the US? Then it is not atma, right? Development is many things to it. So I teach a class on

35:37 pol politics of development. In fact, I'm teaching it this semester that is semester which starts next week. So we define development in both political and economic terms. In political terms, we talk about development in terms of human rights, democracy, people giving all individuals having the freedom to practice their religion, practice their lives, their conscience etc. No pressure from the government, no fear from the government etc. So freedom is an important measure of political development. uh besides institutions uh like uh independent judiciary uh freedom of press look at India's rank on freedom of press it is 150 or something that means you're politically

36:24 not fully developed if your judicial look at the the ele election commission of India it is it's become a joke if the election commission can't be an independent institution standing up to the government look at Jerome Powell the Fed the the leader of the American Federal Reserve Bank, he's not succumbing to Donald Trump at all. He's standing up to Donald Trump. Now, that is a sign of political development. So, you should have all your institutions standing up free then you're politically developed. Economically developed indications are very clear. literacy levels, health care. The best one is human development

37:09 index, HDI, and India is ranked 130 along with Bangladesh. There are 129 countries which are more economically and socially developed than India. So, how can you say yes, you have the fastest growing GDP, but like I said, it doesn't make because that number is there. Modi's government uses it to tell you. Let me give you an example. India has a $4 trillion economy. Let us say it grows with six and a half. Let's say it grows with seven. If it grows with 7%, that's not going to happen. But let's say if it grows with 7%, fastest growing economy at $4 trillion, it will add how much? $280

37:55 billion to its total GDP. So India will go from 4 to 4.28. 28. And if you look at the US at $30 trillion, even if it goes by only 2%. It'll add $600 billion. So the US will go from 30 to 30.6. Yeah, you can say you are the fastest growing but in terms of percentage, but in terms of sheer volume, the US will be the fastest growing economy. That's why in the past 5 years US has added two indias to its GDP. In 2021 the US was 21 trillion. Now it is $30

38:42 trillion. It has added $9 trillion in the last 5 to 6 years after co uh planet earth. Of course, India would survive the sanctions. It will just get hurt. I told you before that the sanctions if they remain in place, they will reduce India's growth rate by 6%. So, India could go from 6.5 to either 6.2 or 5.9%. That's it's not going to die. It's not devastating. But there's an article in the New York Times today which talked about how dangerous those sanctions can be for the Indian economy. Uh

39:29 I don't know Ashwanka those things don't impress me. People try to think that oh we are selling $100 million of bramos to Philippines is something great. I don't know that's nothing. You know India is going and buying $9 billion worth of drones from the US. He's buying $8 billion worth of uh uh S400s from Russia and so on. Those are big things. And bramos is not exactly an Indian thing. People keep pretending as if it's half Indian and half Russian. The technology came from Russia. The manufacturing is Indian. Uh so the moss in the brahos the moss is the name of the Russian company from where the technology came. Vishal chasia hello sir to you too. Good morning soul of

40:15 India. Oh okay. So, I need to just ban somebody. It's gone. Do you think Russia wants to reduce its post-war dependency on China? That's a good question, Kunal. That's a good question for Putin. the the movement towards the west trying to sell energy back to uh Europe rather than just to India and China would be diversification for Russia and reduction independence on China. Uh Scott Bessent today said something very interesting. He said that China was always buying Russian oil even

41:01 before the war. It was 11% of all Russian oil was going to China and now it's about 16% sorry 16% of Chinese oil now comes from uh Russia. Before that it was only 11. So China has just bought 5% more oil from Russia. China is very diversified unlike India which went from 2% to 40% of its uh energy now comes from Russia. Russia is not worried so much about dependency on India. We will see what India does. There's already reports that India India has reduced uh buying Russian oil from 1.8 million barrels a day to just 400,000. So less than 25%.

41:47 So we will see what happens. If if India stops buying Russian economy, we'll be in little trouble. So uh Putin will want to reach out to Mr. H has a very interesting point. Has he received a triple tala from USA, China and Russia? No, but I think he has received two tala from the US. No, it's hanging on one uh great conqueror. Okay. Uh shift currency why whole time India India I don't know is you come and watch India India. Do you watch the ones I do on on Russia and China? The last of the last four shows, they're mostly on Alaska and Ukraine. And India is fun. I'm from India. That's why I talk about India. And I want to

42:33 have an impact on India. That's why I want all the shows in India. That's my personal goal. And you are here. That tells me that it's working. Yeah, I agree with you, Mat. People are not being very critical. Modi is now after trying to sabotage SEO twice, is now going back was for SEO summit to China, you know, Koserbakt. Yeah, that's that's the conclusion I wanted you to reach. India is not exercising its strategic autonomy by moving towards China. It will have to accept a lot of uh make a lot of

43:21 concessions to China with regards to other things. So we'll see what happens going forward. uh it's not a done deal and uh Anurak Parik yeah in a way in a way the US is afraid because in all simulations China has defeated the US in wars because the US can't bring its entire 100% army to fight China. It's like Russia attacking Ukraine. You have to have three times the force. So if US wants to attack China, it will have to bring three times the force that China has. And now China has the world's biggest navy. And I think it's only in the air force that the US is uh

44:08 numerically more than China. But otherwise, China's and unlike India, China doesn't buy its own technology, weapons, it makes them. See, the real power is one who makes weapons and fights with them, not one who buys weapons and fights with them. Because if you are dependent on someone else to buy weapons, then if the war goes long, you're finished. I don't know what you mean. One post values India is a big friend of Taliban right now more than the in the US

45:02 China Vive Ppuri has a strange question but nevertheless I think Pakistan is also practicing its own strategic autonomy right now Pakistan's foreign policy looks much better than India's it has good relations with all powers It has good relations with China, very good relations. China stood up with it during operations even though no country came to India's support and then now the US is like reaching out to Pakistan and is rapidly improving relations and if you remember it is Russia that invited China Pakistan to become a member of bricks and it is there have been overtures from Russia towards Pakistan. You should Google that and you'll be very surprised. So I will right now rate India Russia relations better than

45:48 Pakistan Russia but Pakistan China Pakistan US relations are better than India China India US relations. All right it's getting very late so I will take one or two more questions. Hassan Siddi Professor Ahan unfortunately to hear crap from folks in India for speaking is mine. I know. Ah Chris Moses how are you? Nice to see you. Chris is a member of conversations. I love it when members come. What if India became client state of China? India might have to do that. Look at the huge dependence. Vive puri. I don't know what you mean by 155, but I think that is the total amount of trade that India does with China and Hong Kong combined.

46:38 Uh I don't know what he's laughing about. Yeah, total you know people under count China's trade and to say that the US is the biggest trading partner by saying it's 131 billion but actually India's trade with China is 127 and India's trade with uh Hong Kong is about 28 billion. So India has a deficit of 13 um billion dollars with Hong Kong and it has a deficit of literally $99 billion. So with both the China, Hong Kong, India has 112. So India's total exports to these countries are about $20 billion in India's imports are in in much much much in excess of that.

47:26 What is strange? Some people are like very strange. I'm from India and I'm an American citizen. What's so confusing about that? Especially for vishwa gurus, it should not be too much on their IQ levels to understand that. Oh wow. Thank you very much. Uh Deendra Chawan, yes I do. uh I have I mean this government has doesn't like me obviously for whatever I mean it's very clear that my Muslim identity makes them angry about me and so you can see from the comments that I've deleted just now and otherwise but yeah

48:13 I'm always open to giving advice I give it to the US government all the time I've given advice to the British government I work closely with the German government uh whenever foreign governments have consulted me. I in fact uh in 2008 the Indian defense ISA had also invited me and I went there and spoke and when I was in India and Delhi I spoke at many think tanks. So I give my advice freely. Uh Ashwan Kumar yes China has just now realized that it can handle the US on its own.

48:59 If India wants to tag along that is great but India will have to make concessions to China not the other way around. So if India wants to make concessions to a foreign power why not to the US? Oh, that's a good question from Amit Malikar. Amit, that's a good question. I'm going to recommend that to to my students to write papers on it undergraduate. If India China relations improve, will China put pressure on Pakistan to behave itself with India and so leading to improvement of India Pakistan relations? That's a good question. And uh right now I mean I have some ideas in my head but I don't think I can give you a proper answer because

49:46 the things that China can control in Pakistan are not the only reasons why India is upset. India uses Pakistan and Bangladesh as a surrogate. So when Modi wants to say nasty things about Muslims these days he doesn't say that about Indian Muslims directly. He will say that about Pakistanis or Bangladeshis. So the moment Modi starts saying bad things about Pakistanis, he becomes very popular with his Hindua supporters and that upsets the Pakistanis. So will Modi stop uh using the Hindu Muslim card? uh because both Pakistan and Bangladesh are Chinese assets because China cannot

50:32 put pressure on Bangladesh and Pakistan to have better relations with India unless you change the way Indians talk about those two countries. So that is the question. Very good question Amit per Swami I don't know what you said but anything that is produced is part of the GDP if I teach you mathematics X for 1 hour and you give me 5 rupees or 50 rupees or

51:19 $10 or $100 that goes into GDP2. Uh I was in UP. I was in UP. If you go to my channel which is now banned in India. If you have VPN go take a look at it and you can see all the lectures I gave in Delhi. Well I went to Delhi. I've been to UP before. I've been to Agra and Lucknau. I went to I am Lucknau and gave I won a debate there many many years ago. But okay I will come to UP and I want to see how UP is. I have to go. I might be there in January actually uh in some parts of UP. I have never

52:07 been to Aliger Muslim University. I have received two awards from Aligar Muslim University, lifetime service awards uh to scholarship and to research and uh they are somewhere here in the room and uh so I have to go to Aligar also. I've never been there. So yes, I will come to UP and I'll definitely do a show about UP. Uh okay. All right guys, it's it's quite late now. I have to go to sleep. Uh yes 20 kam pasad profess focus on economics very much and so very much on

52:52 I don't know your sentence is a bit confusing prasad okay Lakshmi welcome how are you so Lakshmi Ayar India has not changed its position of one China policy So India does not recognize Taiwan as a country still. So India has the same policy towards Taiwan uh that it had previously. So there is no basic change and now of course India is not going to make any such decisions. U but it is quite possible that India has allowed the relations to with Taiwan to improve. There are a lot of investments from Taiwan. Foxcon is a

53:39 Taiwanese company. Uh so you I don't think India is going to recognize Taiwan. I mean that'll be over. That's finished between India and China if India recognizes Taiwan as an independent country. Even the US doesn't. Uh so it is not a member of the UN for example. In fact last month uh the Taiwanese president wanted to go to uh Latin America. So they fly into Los Angeles here in the US and then they go to Brazil and Argentina. So the Taiwanese leaders have in the past used it as an excuse to come to America. So they come to America saying oh we are going to Brazil we going to Argentina or somewhere like that and uh this time

54:24 Trump didn't allow that didn't allow he says you can come here as a private citizen you can simply change your flights and travel continue like any other person but uh there will be no recognition officially no meeting by any American official was made clear so the so the Taiwanese uh president whatever cancelled the trip. Uh yeah, you're right. Biology first is the word bank politics. Anyway, thank you very much everybody for watching conversations. If you have not subscribed to the channel, please subscribe to the channel, like this video, press the bell icon, and don't

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