NARENDRA Modi did everything an Indian prime minister could possibly do to turbocharge the Australia-India relationship.
Modi praised Tony Abbott’s leadership and declared that for India, Australia was “no longer on the periphery of our region but at the heart of our thoughts”.
Modi invited Australia to help India reach its goal of prosperity. He invited Australia too to increase its security co-operation with India, especially in maritime security.
Modi praised Tony Abbott’s leadership and declared that for India, Australia was “no longer on the periphery of our region but at the heart of our thoughts”.
Modi invited Australia to help India reach its goal of prosperity. He invited Australia too to increase its security co-operation with India, especially in maritime security.
He talked of investment, trade, services, above all the shared values
of democracy, the heritage of cricket and the common struggle for human
freedom. He expressed the maximum possible ambition for the relationship
in a speech which was everything his Australian hosts could have hoped
for.
There was plenty of humour in a speech of considerable charm. Surely, in subjecting parliamentarians to speeches from three visiting leaders, Modi said, Tony Abbott was “shirt-fronting” his own MPs.
The India relationship is full of potential. It is already substantial. No one should sneeze at $15 billion in annual trade, nor at the giant new Indian investment in Australia’s coal industry, nor at half a million Australians of Indian background, nor at the growing numbers of Indian students at Australian universities.
The upside potential is enormous. India offers Australia its third great Asian growth story. First there was Japan, fuelling our postwar boom, then China, revving up the resources boom. Now hundreds of millions of Indians are set to join the middle class and bring middle class wants and needs with them.
Australian resources exports to India should boom, but the potential for services exports is almost limitless. Abbott and Modi have committed to completing a free-trade agreement between the two countries by the end of next year.
This will really test Andrew Robb. For the complexity and political difficulty of doing a good deal with India will make China look like child’s play.
The challenge for Abbott is to set the relationship on its natural growth trajectory. In time, India should be as important to the Australian economy as Japan and China are.
- GREG SHERIDAN for' The Australian'
There was plenty of humour in a speech of considerable charm. Surely, in subjecting parliamentarians to speeches from three visiting leaders, Modi said, Tony Abbott was “shirt-fronting” his own MPs.
The India relationship is full of potential. It is already substantial. No one should sneeze at $15 billion in annual trade, nor at the giant new Indian investment in Australia’s coal industry, nor at half a million Australians of Indian background, nor at the growing numbers of Indian students at Australian universities.
The upside potential is enormous. India offers Australia its third great Asian growth story. First there was Japan, fuelling our postwar boom, then China, revving up the resources boom. Now hundreds of millions of Indians are set to join the middle class and bring middle class wants and needs with them.
Australian resources exports to India should boom, but the potential for services exports is almost limitless. Abbott and Modi have committed to completing a free-trade agreement between the two countries by the end of next year.
This will really test Andrew Robb. For the complexity and political difficulty of doing a good deal with India will make China look like child’s play.
The challenge for Abbott is to set the relationship on its natural growth trajectory. In time, India should be as important to the Australian economy as Japan and China are.
- GREG SHERIDAN for' The Australian'
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