The recent visit of Anwar Ibrahim, Prime Minister of Malaysia, to India, significantly raised the profile of India- Malaysia relations.
India-Malaysia Strategic Relationship
Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Kuala Lumpur in 2015 and raised the relationship to an “ enhanced strategic cooperation ”. The India- Malaysia relationship is now a
“ comprehensive strategic cooperation ” in tune with the India- ASEAN CSP of 2022. This is likely to come from an ASEAN- Plus relationship with added factors which are not with all ASEAN countries. That Malaysia will be president of ASEAN for 2025 has added significance.
profitable cooperation is looking up. As the profitable lead for ASEAN, Malaysia will seek to quicken the review of the AITIGA, presently afoot. Bilateral trade is$ 20 billion, the third largest within ASEAN. Large exports of win oil painting give Malaysia a fat. The CEOs Forum seeks to enhance commerce and new value chains. These will add vigor to the traditional cooperation and semiconductors, renewables, motorcars and corridors and electronics are important fresh parts.
Malaysia has brought$ 5 billion of FDI into India in recent times. A focus on digital technologies saw an MOU signed during the visit besides a scowl among Financial Services Authorities. Trading in their own currencies has started. A RuPay arrangement is under consideration once the mechanics are worked out. After Singapore, this is the most vigorous cooperation in digital technology and frugality with any ASEAN country.
Moral Partnership between India- Malaysia
Diaspora and mortal coffers are a significant achievement of this visit. The 2009 MOU having lapsed, now a wider scowl on the reclamation, employment and extradition of workers has been inked. Besides having a large diaspora, India also has workers in Malaysia. Their protection and wealth remain important. The model employment agreement attached to the scowl provides a frame for this.
No public statement on the repatriation of Zakir Naik — wanted in India — replaced. PM Anwar in response to a question after a public lecture, said that if sufficient substantiation was submitted, the Malaysian system would not blink terrorism. India did not feel to have labored the point then.
Tourism is a new smash. One million Indian excursionists could visit Malaysia in 2024. Malaysian tourism to India is growing sluggishly, to about, better than utmost ASEAN countries. About 220 daily breakouts between the two countries, including from Tier II metropolises, rounded the rise of tourism. Visa facilitation from both sides has eased. Tourism as a profitable and P2P multiplier is recognized. IIT Kharagpur is opening its Malaysia lot soon.
Insights on the India – Malaysia vantage View
Malaysia is one of the countries which has a contentious relationship with China on the South China Sea. Still, unlike the Philippines, Malaysia has no collision with China, preferring quiet tactfulness and assenting to Chinese maritime exertion through their EEZ with a preference for Chinese profitable exertion. They were reticent to bandy the part of China in the SCS, as substantiated in responses at the public lecture; the conversations between the leaders concentrated on the environment of free and open ocean lines of communication, navigation, marketable shipping and overflight. India made it clear that whatever some ASEAN countries may do with China, Indians could not accept the South China Sea getting a Chinese lake.
Regarding defense cooperation, there have been addresses on comity of outfit since Malaysia too had Soviet- period outfit and conservation and extension of service life are areas in constant discussion. India would like to export more recently developed defense outfits. HAL has an office in Kuala Lumpur and pursued a Tejas contract, which was lost to a Korean contender. There are other aeronautics contracts, and the Brahmos is now available to ASEAN countries. Specifics were not bandied, but a closer engagement is possible.
Source : The Indian Express
Conclusion
India and Malaysia seek a further just and multipolar world order and their better placement in it. Malaysia offered support for India as an endless member in a reformed UN Security Council indeed as it sought support from India to join BRICS. India ate Malaysia’s operation for positive consideration when BRICS discussed the coming phase of expansion. From ASEAN, Vietnam and Thailand have also applied to join BRICS.
The Modi- Anwar understanding is manifesting itself in a briskly improvement of the cooperation. It’s erecting on the India- ASEAN relationship with significant ASEAN- plus features which Malaysia is well suited for and willing to pursue for straightening India-Malaysia ties. He is a former minister to Germany, Indonesia & ASEAN, Ethiopia and the African Union .
