BRICS 2026: India faces the challenge to forge consensus in a divided world

Diplomacy is a very tricky and very subtle business. It could be more so because of the ongoing turbulence in world geopolitics, with at least two ongoing major military conflicts that have in them the seeds of another Great War. And it would be much more so when warring states sit across the table. As will be the case when Iran and the United Arab Emirates share the table with India playing the host.

Meanwhile, India faces its own dilemma and challenges. While the stated aim of BRICS 2026 that gets underway in New Delhi on September 12-13, as far as India is concerned, is to hammer out a consensus that can be mirrored in a joint statement, India has to walk the talk on its positional philosophy of strategic autonomy.

Not only does New Delhi have to act out its principled stand, just like justice, but it has to be seen doing so too. While there is already a brownie point for India in having ensured the presence of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on September 11 in a much-anticipated bilateral meet, in the likely attendance of Chinese President Xi Jinping with a huge 400-strong delegation, the challenges are quite Himalayan.

Broadly, the effort has also to be that BRICS is not to be seen as a confrontationist body against the US-led West and as an enabler of the move against the US dollar, like the Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov, who told Indian newsmen on Tuesday that those who repeatedly frame BRICS as an anti-Western alliance were making a great mistake.

In the same breath, however, Peskov said Russia conducts 90 per cent of all its payments and transactions with BRICS countries in local currencies. India will have to tread the fine line here. It will also have to control the narrative against a growing predominance of the Chinese, who have grown from strength to strength as the two major powers are embroiled in military conflicts—the US in Iran and Russia in Ukraine. One must remember that with every bullet fired and every boat sunk in the ongoing conflicts, China’s power and therefore influence is getting a lift.

India’s focus will also be on the bilaterals. With China, it could be a build-up on the gradually warming ties that hinges heavily on border disentanglement. Notably, senior commander-level talks just took place between senior generals from both sides in Arunachal Pradesh, which itself is considered a contested geography. With trade relations going great guns, many would perhaps see India-China ties at a take-off stage.

With Russia, an important aspect of the bilaterals could focus on defence, including the question of progress on the issue of India considering the purchase of the fifth-generation Su-57 fighter aircraft.

At the same time, India will have to ensure that its voice remains among the strongest in the Global South.

Will the BRICS summit and the meetings on the sidelines achieve all that, or merely be a case of a toned-down verdict, is anyone’s guess.