Having blitzed through September with high voltage summits spanning half the world, Prime Minister NarendraModi will embark on a second spree of big ticket summits in November. Except this time, Modi will concentrate on Asia.
From November 12, Modi will be in NayPyi Daw for the Asean-India and East Asia Summits. This summit gets top billing from the Indian establishment because the East Asia process is India's gateway into the Asian security environment. Modi is likely to go the extra mile in Myanmar, given its importance in India's security and economic matrix. Myanmar is not only India's gateway to Southeast Asia, it's critical for managing insurgency in the northeast. In addition, India is in the process of building an economic corridor through Myanmar to Thailand and perhaps beyond. Therefore, questions were raised why the Myanmar leadership was not invited to Modi's swearing-in ceremony like leaders of other neighbouring countries.
From Myanmar, Modi is scheduled to travel to Australia for the G20 summit. The summit in Brisbane this year will be Modi's first meeting with many of the G20 heads of government. Clearly India wants the G20 process to mean more than a mere talking shop. Modi has appointed Suresh Prabhu as Sherpa for G20, which is a significant appointment.
Modi will be the first Indian PM to do a bilateral summit in Australia after Mrs Indira Gandhi. He has scheduled a bilateral summit with Tony Abbott after the G20 meet, making it the first time ever that India and Australia would be doing bilateral summits within the same calendar year, a sign of how important Australia has become in India's priorities.
The third week of November will be reserved for the Saarc summit to be held in Nepal this time. Modi has already done a bilateral visit to Nepal, but Saarc is close to his heart and India is expected to push things along in this sleepy regional organization in line with Modi's neighbourhood focus. The PM is also supposed to travel to Janakpur and Lumbini in Nepal which will add a couple more days to his itinerary.
Chinese president Xi Jinping has also invited Modi as a special invitee to the Beijing APEC summit in mid-November. Modi, said sources, is yet to take a call on this invitation, but it looks difficult. However, Modi might be tempted, given India has been quite keen to get into this economic grouping, which has closed off membership for over a decade.
