“India could be the superpower of the 21st century – or a juggernaut gone off the rails”

The 21st century, declared Narendra Modi after his first term in 2014, would be “India’s century”.

This weekend, world leaders will gather in New Delhi for the G20 summit. And they will arrive in a country with one of the fastest growing economies in the world. A country that is the largest country in the world in terms of population, with 1.5 billion people, and a country that celebrated the Chandrayaan-3 moon landing two weeks ago.

A few days ago, the Indian space program also launched a mission to explore the far reaches of the Sun. The Greek myth of Icarus tells the story of what happens when you fly too close to the Sun. It is a story of pride, bravado and excessive ambition. Some wonder if this warning could apply to India.

Is it poised to become the first superpower of the 21st century? Or is it a heavy weight that risks derailing? In a recent interview, Ashoka Mody, author of India is Broken, said the story of the nation marching on the world stage was "completely divorced" from the reality of the vast majority of Indians.

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The economist added: “India is broken in the sense that for hundreds of millions of Indians, it is difficult to find jobs and education and healthcare are poor. “The justice system is coercive and brutal. Air quality remains extremely poor. The rivers are dying. And it is not certain that things will improve. »

Prime Minister Modi will want to show G20 leaders a different India. Its guide profiles a country with a booming economy, the world's fastest-growing technology sector and a digitized banking system. Growing at an average of 6% per year, India is on track to overtake Germany and Japan to become the world's third-largest economy by 2030, after the United States and China.

Great powers are scrambling to take advantage of this growing market, with France, Germany and, belatedly, Britain seeking new economic deals. Boris Johnson has promised a post-Brexit trade deal with India by the Diwali holiday in October 2022. That deadline is long past and negotiations remain mired in disagreements over tariffs and visa allocation.

It had been hoped that Rishi Sunak, son of Indian immigrants, practicing Hindu and son-in-law of Indian billionaire Narayana Murthy, would be better placed to grease the wheels of negotiations. There is even talk of the Prime Minister returning to India in the fall to seal the deal (and watch a bit of the Cricket World Cup).

But no amount of goodwill can overcome the main stumbling block: the UK is a country of 67 million people seeking a deal with a country of 1.5 billion people, which considers its peers like the United States and China, and not like its former colonial power. Modi's determination to erase all traces of British rule could extend to renaming his country Bharat.

Speculation about the name change was fueled after invitations to a G20 leaders' dinner were sent out in the name of the 'President of Bharat'. Yet while the United States and China...