Sunday, 13 Oct, 2024
By: Anshul Vipat
In a surprise gesture, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held an unannounced meeting on Friday in Samarkand on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit.
In a surprise gesture, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held an unannounced meeting on Friday in Samarkand on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit. The Ministry of External Affairs, in a statement, said, “Both leaders reviewed India-Turkey relations. While noting the increase in recent years in economic relations, particularly bilateral trade, they acknowledged the potential for further enhancement of economic and commercial linkages.”
The unscheduled meeting has come as a surprise for foreign experts. The face-to-face meeting comes almost two years after a frosty moment following Erdogan's comments on Kashmir. The comments along with Turkey's growing closeness with Pakistan had effectively put India-Turkey relations in a cold storage.
The rise and fall of India-Turkey relationship
India and Turkey have shared bilateral ties for centuries. The first exchange of diplomatic missions between the Ottoman Empire and Delhi Sultanate dates back to 12-13th century. Trade relationship was established between Turkey and the sultanates of Gujarat, Bijapur, Ahmednagar and Mysore. Unfortunately, in the past recent years, this age-old relationship, however, is on a downward spiral. The historical bond is declining so rapidly that both are now openly exchanging diplomatic blows at the global stage.
The worsening of the relationship was triggered by Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s interference in India’s domestic affairs. Turkey was a vocal advocate of Pakistan's position on the Kashmir dispute. It went public in 2019 when Ankara criticized India on the issue of Jammu and Kashmir and the revocation of article 370. Speaking at the UNGA UN General Assembly in September 2019, Erdogan said Kashmir “is still besieged”. He repeated this stance in 2020 and 2021.
This led to a flurry of tit-for-tat responses between India and Turkey. India responded by increasing its ties with Cyprus, Armenia and Greece. All of these states have various disputes with Turkey. The frosty relationship also had an impact on cultural exchanges between the two countries. New Delhi also decided to cut its defense exports to Turkey, which primarily included weaponry such as explosives and detonators. India also significantly reduced its imports from Turkey.
As evident from the above chart, the total trade between the two countries had improved from $ 2.5 billion in 2012 to USD 7.84 billion in 2018-19 However, since the diplomatic spat the trade volume gone down. Bilateral trade dropped to USD 7.086 billion in 2019-20. As of 2021, the total exports to Turkey stood at $4.9 billion, while total imports was $1.4 billion.
Modi and Erdogan seems to have broken the ice by meeting for the first time in two years. The meeting could provide a breakthrough in ties between the two countries. Despite sharing an uneasy relationship and shadow boxing each other in international platforms, New Delhi and Ankara are unlikely to remain permanently locked in any kind of low-intensity cold war.
