NEW DELHI: India and Qatar elevated on Tuesday their ties to a strategic partnership, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani on his state visit to New Delhi — the first in nearly a decade.
On the two-day trip, the Qatari ruler was accompanied by a high-level delegation, including ministers and business leaders. This is his second official visit to India. The first was in March 2015.
Breaking with established norms, Modi personally welcomed the emir at the New Delhi airport as he arrived in the Indian capital on Monday evening. Their meeting was held at Hyderabad House on Tuesday afternoon.
“Both sides have today agreed to elevate their relationship to a strategic partnership, and India and Qatar have signed an agreement in this regard today,” Arun Kumar Chatterjee, international affairs secretary at the Ministry of External Affairs, told reporters after the meeting.
“What we are looking at is deepening cooperation in the fields of trade, energy investment, (and) security, as well as in the regional and international forum.”
Among Gulf Cooperation Council countries, India already has strategic partnerships with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman, and Kuwait.
“Trade, investment and energy were among the major topics of discussion between the two leaders today. The trade today between India and Qatar is about $14 billion annually. Both sides have agreed to set a target to double this in the next five years,” Chatterjee said.
“Both leaders today identified a number of areas in which the Qatar Investment Authority can increase investments in India. This includes infrastructure, ports, shipbuilding, energy — including renewable energy, smart cities, food, parks, startups and new technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics and machine learning.”
The QIA, Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, currently has about $1.5 billion in direct foreign investment in India’s retail, power, IT, education, health, and housing sectors.
Indians make up the largest expatriate community in Qatar with over 700,000 Indian nationals living and working in the Gulf state.
An agreement on the avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion was also signed during the visit, as well as memoranda of understanding on cooperation in archives and documentation, youth affairs and sports.
Anil Trigunayat, former diplomat and a distinguished fellow at the Vivekananda International Foundation think tank in New Delhi, told Arab News that while the key feature of the visit was the “strategic partnership, which means greater collaboration in defense security, space and cyber cooperation,” it was significant not only for bilateral relations, “but also for exchanging views on the US approach to the region and ending the Gaza war, where Qatar is playing a critical role.”
