At a media briefing on July 4, India’s Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra vehemently asserted that the fact that the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit was held virtually “in no way signifies, hints, insinuates the dilution in the objectives that we are trying to seek of the SCO Summit”. He did not disclose, however, any reason for not holding the summit physically or in hybrid mode. To emphasise India’s commitment to the SCO, Mr. Kwatra dwelt on the political, economic and cultural initiatives the country had taken and the 134 meetings and events which it had convened during its SCO presidency. What Mr. Kwatra overlooked was the legitimate point —it is precisely because India had invested so much effort in the SCO that the summit should have been held physically or in a hybrid manner. That would have imparted it greater salience.
Mr. Kwatra’s failure to give even one credible reason for having a virtual summit indicates that India is moving away from the approaches which led it to become an SCO full member in 2017. At that stage Prime Minister Narendra Modi still held the belief that he could reach a modus vivendi with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the contentious issues which plague the India-China relationship. Hence, despite the SCO’s origins and the influence exercised by China over it, he enthusiastically went ahead with India’s full membership.
