A bridge to Tokyo

India must take advantage of Japanese enthusiasm

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's trip to Japan was marked by considerable bonhomie, and should be considered a signal public-relations success. The Japanese government has, over the past years, gone out of its way to woo India - even scheduling a rare state visit by the Emperor and Empress of Japan to India. There is no doubt that Mr Modi's considerable political talents, and his comfortable personal equation with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, have come in handy; in terms of atmospherics, the relationship has never been warmer.

It is less easy to quantify the tangible outcomes of Mr Modi's five-day visit. Several major breakthroughs still didn't happen - whether on market access for Indian generics, on high-speed rail, or on civil nuclear co-operation. Still, on all those counts, it is possible that expectations were too high. Mr Abe did announce a big $35-billion push for Japanese investment in India over the next five years. This includes both private sector and state spending, and is to be funnelled into various infrastructure sectors - including industrial parks and food-processing supply chains. Mr Modi's "make in India" mantra, to become reality, needs infrastructure finance, and Japan's needs for an overseas investment destination that isn't China lines up neatly with India's need for infrastructure financing. The question is whether the bonhomie and the economic incentives can be translated, by India's notoriously slow state processes, into reality. For its own sake, India must not disappoint the Japanese.

What has been underlined by Mr Modi's demeanour and statements on this trip is that he has been working on creating a more muscular, more engaged, and more nationalistic foreign policy for India. Whether at the World Trade Organization, where he made sure that India did not sign on the trade facilitation agreement until what he believed to be India's concerns were adequately addressed; or in cancelling talks with Pakistan on what appeared to be minimal provocation, there is a comprehensive shifting of India's stand in progress. In Japan, Mr Modi answered questions and called for investment; but his rhetoric spoke of Indian civilisation and culture, not just of India as an investment destination. This new approach to foreign policy is clearly organic and personal. What does stand out, however, is the big exception; Mr Modi will have disappointed his hosts in once again ducking questions about China, saying "let's think about ourselves". The state-controlled media in the People's Republic has often pointed out how India has rebuffed attempts to be corralled into anything even slightly resembling an attempt to encircle or contain Chinese ambition. It would seem that Mr Modi has not departed from that template. After all, China is as likely a source of much-needed infrastructure financing as is Japan. Beijing, however, will not be completely relieved: An agreement to joint exercises with Japan and the United States, and a veiled reference to Chinese "expansionism", suggests that Mr Modi is keeping his options open.