India has been regional power providing complete security in Indo-Pacific - Defence Minister Rajnath Singh

New Delhi – Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has said that India is a regional power that provides complete security in the Indo-Pacific region. The Defence Minister spoke during the Samanvay 2022 exercise organised under the ‘Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief-HADR’. It has surfaced that China has been taking special initiatives to increase its activities in the Indian Ocean region for the past few weeks. Against that background, statements made by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh draw attention.

China organised a meeting of the China-Indian Ocean Region Forum on November 21. The Indian and Pacific Oceans have been collectively referred to as Indo-Pacific. This makes it easier to look at China’s hegemonic activities in this maritime area. Hence, the United States also changed the name of its Navy’s Pacific Command to Indo-Pacific Command. But China does not accept this change. To answer it, China refers to the Indian Ocean region as the China-Indian Ocean Region. The main thing is that in this China-Indian Ocean Region meeting, China had invited 19 countries in this region, refusing India to involve.

Among these countries, Maldives and Australia shocked China by declaring that their official representatives were not in the meeting. The Indian Defence Minister then made significant statements regarding the Indo-Pacific region. The Defence Minister asserted that India is a regional power providing total security in the Indo-Pacific region. Also, the Defence Minister pointed out that India has been cooperating with other countries for the security of this region. It has freshly become clear that countries like the US, France and Canada have been looking at India as an important security partner in the Indo-Pacific region.

Moreover, US Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro toured India recently and visited the aircraft carrier INS Vikrant. Del Toro had said that he was impressed by this aircraft carrier. After that, India and France held the annual defence conference between the Defence Ministers of the two countries. The Indo-Pacific region issue was also discussed in the talks at that time. In this meeting, India and France announced further increasing the scope of exercises of their defence forces in the Indo-Pacific region. Besides, Canada released its Indo-Pacific policy just one day ago, mentioning India as an important partner in the maritime sector.

All these things underline the strategic importance of the Indo-Pacific region and India’s position in it. Along with the US, Canada and France, the UK has also shown eagerness to increase cooperation with India in the Indo-Pacific region. Moreover, Australia has initiated moves to give special importance to collaboration at all levels with India, and the two countries have also signed a free trade agreement. It will be implemented soon. The US, Canada, France, the UK and Australia have strained relations with China for various reasons. Also, US defence forces officials have repeatedly warned that a threat to the US from China is possible. At the G20 summit in Indonesia, Canadian President Justin Trudeau’s sharp differences with the Chinese President became public. Furthermore, France says there is possibly a threat to its islands in the Indo-Pacific region from China. At the same time, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak declared that the golden era of his country’s relations with China was over. Apart from that, Australia has strongly opposed the hegemonic activities of China.

In such a situation, India’s importance as a powerful and responsible country in the Indo-Pacific region has been increasing. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has mentioned India as a regional power providing complete security in this maritime sector and has made the world aware that India can contribute greatly to eliminating the imbalance created by China’s hegemonic activities.

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