Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni landed in New Delhi on Thursday to participate as the chief guest at the 8th Raisina Dialogue, 2023 with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. She also held bilateral meetings with the Indian prime minister during her visit. It is expected that the two countries will sign a defence cooperation agreement. The last visit of an Italian prime minister to India was Giuseppe Conte in 2018 and PM Modi visited Italy for G20 in October 2021. Meloni is Italy’s first female prime minister in its history and at 45, the second youngest.
Meloni’s visit to India is significant as it continues former Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s efforts to bring the two democracies together and create a market as well as a friendshoring destination in India, as a significant alternative to China. During Draghi’s term, Italy seriously started recognising the dangers that China posed to its democracy, economy and technology and started taking concrete steps to counter China’s aggression. Draghi also put into place a concrete foreign policy in Rome, which his predecessors had largely ignored.
Meloni, instead, has started her term with a clear objective of building on Draghi’s efforts and bringing back Italy’s status as one of Europe’s leaders; her India visit is part of her strategy to make Italy count as a global player.
In her first 100 days, apart from ensuring energy independence from Russia, and formalising and consolidating Italy’s role in North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), she has also put her ‘Mattei’ plan in place (‘Marshall plan’ for Africa). The plan aims to make Italy Europe’s energy hub, its supplier of gas from North Africa, creating a strategic alternative to Russian gas by sourcing it from Azerbaijan, Algeria and eventually Libya and Israel. If Meloni’s plan bears fruit, Italy will be able to receive between 50-70 billion Cubic meters of gas by 2025, not only weaning it off Russian gas completely but also giving it a significant surplus to supply neighbouring countries such as Austria. Most importantly, it wrests European Union (EU) energy leadership from Germany which has been a key player in the supply of Russian gas to all EU countries, given it controls the pipelines from Russia.
Most important, however, is the competition between the three European powers–France, Germany and Italy–for leadership in the EU. So far, the EU has been dominated by the Franco-German axis. French President Emmanuel Macron, who is from a very diverse political party than the Italian Prime Minister, would like to see her fail. Not only did Meloni’s Prime Ministership start with a spat with Macron on the issue of migrants, but he also excluded her from a hastily organised dinner for Ukrainian President Zelenskyy at the Élysée Palace for which the German Chancellor Olaf Scholz was invited.
However, Meloni has risen above these petty snubs, reminding Macron that such politics divide Europe and doesn’t unite it. In a geopolitical scenario where the world is polarised between democracies and autocracies, and China looks to be siding with Russia, the timing of Meloni’s visit to India could not have been more opportune.
The visit will lay the basis for the two countries, which share an ancient relationship and have no colonial history, to develop a bilateral partnership which is mutually beneficial. Both countries have vast coasts and Italy has strong marine and defence technology. Meloni and her party Brothers of Italy (Fratelli dItalia, FDI) are strong supporters of Taiwan. Both India and Italy have strong business links with China and need to balance politically checking China with their own economic interests. India shares a contentious 3400 km border with China, and both countries, despite their skirmishes and conflicts, manage to balance trade relations so far. Meloni will look for such a balanced relationship with India.
From “friend-sourcing” to supply chain resilience, Italy can rely on India as a long-term partner. Shrugging off a decade of animosity, Meloni and Modi seem to be preparing to start a new friendship between ancient allies and trade partners. India will naturally be curious to know if she will renew the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) agreement with China when it expires later this year. Meloni will try and recruit Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has publicly berated his ally and friend Russian President Vladimir Putin with his “I know that today’s era is not the era for war,” speech in Samarkhand, to create a new peace proposal for Ukraine after China’s proposal failed to impress or find consensus in the West.
“The approval of the resolution at the United Nations assembly, while decreeing the isolation of Russia, reminded us that we need to intensify contacts with those countries that have still abstained,” she told other leaders during the G7 leaders video conference on the first anniversary of the war. India and China abstained from the vote at the UN.
Apart from Russia and China, economy is a very important common issue between the two leaders. Both Italy and India have a strong dependence on family-owned enterprises, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and agriculture. While the stalled EU-India Free Trade Agreement (FTA) does not allow Italy and India to sign a bilateral agreement on the topic, India is an open market for Italian agro-food processing companies to set up production and sell technology for the domestic market. By 2030, 500 million Indians between the age of 15-35, will make India a large market for fashion, textiles, accessories and makeup, which Italy excels in. India is also undergoing an unprecedented infrastructure expansion where ports, highways, airports and railways are being modernised–areas where Italian companies are technology leaders and trailblazers.
While India shares a strong relationship with France and Modi with Macron, it will do well to look at Italy as its European champion in a “post-Macron” world. Meloni and Italy may well be that alternative ally for India, given Italy’s increasing leadership in Europe.
Finally, India isn’t a stranger to female leaders, it welcomes them. Giorgia Meloni brings a woman’s touch to Italy which has been dominated by male leaders who have been unable to solve its basic problems or restore its rightful place in the global geopolitical scenario. The Meloni-Modi partnership may hold the key to the future of the EU-India partnership in security, the Indo-Pacific, supply chain resilience as well as peace. While India takes its place with the global powers, Meloni’s Italy will be the partner that makes the difference.
Vas Shenoy, an Indo-Italian entrepreneur and writer, has worked closely and continues to advise various governments in Europe, Middle East and Africa. He is the founder of the Dialogue on Democracy. Views expressed are personal.
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