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Transcript of Interview of External Affairs Minister at the Global Technology Summit 2021 (14 December 2021)

December 14, 2021

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Minister, it is wonderful having you at the Global Technology Summit 2021. In opening remarks, you talked about the partnership between the Ministry of External Affairs and Carnegie India, which kicked this off in 2016. At that time, you were the Foreign Secretary in the Government of India. Now, the GTS was part of a larger set of dialogues that was initiated by you at that time, including the Raisina dialogue, which is on foreign policy. You had an economic dialogue; you had an Indian Ocean dialogue. So what was this objective? Has this effort to make India hub of global conversations really been successful?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: Well, Raj, I would say there were two or three objectives that overlapped, obviously. To me, the first objective of initiating set of new dialogues was, I would say, to sort of democratise foreign policy- that it is not something which a set of people should be having amongst themselves in a closed environment. That today, we are a big enough country with large enough interests, with a very diverse-differentiated set of stakeholders, who should be debating what matters, what doesn't, what are the risks, what are the rewards, what are the problems. And, I did it at a time when very frankly, there was also a sense the country itself, the polity itself was getting more democratised, that many of the changes, the changes we saw in 2014, in 2019, were reflective of a larger conversation of broadening out of the political conversations in the country and I suddenly felt that should be the case with foreign policy. The second is, it wasn't just broader for the sake of broader. I think foreign policy is a much more complicated business, certainly than when I started it and it involves many more issues, more specialisation if you would, more domains and suddenly, one of the reasons was technology, that we have not paid enough attention. We viewed technology in a very limited way, something we can talk about later, either promotional way or overcoming denial issues. But it's a much bigger issue. So how do you actually make the conversation more broad based, more specialised. And the third, I would say, partly, for me, it was also generational, that I felt that by doing particularly the Technology Summit, we were reaching to people who were not the traditional foreign policy people, people who knew a lot, whose inputs, we would benefit from, whose thinking, our thinking was something that they also need to know and factoring. And I have actually felt over this five, six years that we have succeeded in many ways, in each of these objectives. And by the way, the bonus of all of this is that our international branding has also gone up. I mean, we are today seen as a country, which has serious events, where different set of people come and talk. And I think that's helped us enormously in terms of our international reputation.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Given all the objectives that you've identified, Bangalore was the right place to do this. Unfortunately, we're not able to go there physically today. But the fact that Bangalore is not only a leading hub of technology in India, but a global technology hub on a range of areas, digital BIOS space. And, have you managed to bridge that gap between the world of politics and policy in Delhi and the world of technology in Bangalore. There's always been a bit of a problem in the past. Are we beginning to bridge that?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: Well, if you remember the first meeting we did, and we actually pretty much had this conversation. And at that time, I told you that I don't think there is that much of a gap or something to that effect. Five, six years later, I would perhaps, somewhat modify my own reply. I think there are different sets of gaps. What is important in Bangalore may not have the same weight in Delhi. The manner in which you look at it may be different. So, again, in a way, Bengaluru is a very international city, but it's very differently international from New Delhi. So, there would be a lot of commonalities, because remember, Bengaluru was also was historically our Space Centre, in many ways, our industrial centre, a research centre, a lot of our key labs were out there. So, it was not that it was disconnected from the government, it was just, it had its own domain or its own set of specialisation. So, I would say yes, each one has their strength, each one, by the way, has their own international standing. But the New Delhi plus Bengaluru is bigger than their aggregate, it gives you a very different sort of image outside in the world. And I think this particular Summit, this particular partnership has helped to foster that.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: In your remarks, Minister, you said, how geopolitics of technology is so central, it's become even more important. geopolitics has always shaped the balance of power between the city states of Greece or in India or in Asia. In your own work, both in your PhD worked on nuclear politics, nuclear diplomacy, then much of your time, career in the Foreign Office, has been about dealing with technology issues, and especially the nuclear deal where 10 years ago, that was the main issue. I mean, you're dealing with the whole challenges of getting out of our isolation that came in in the 70s. So how do you see our effort I mean, are our attitudes to geopolitics of technology changed? Clearly, there was one set of attitudes in the 50s 60s 70s. And now, how do you see the evolution of India's attitudes to geopolitics and technology?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: It’s in a way, an easy question with a very complicated answer, because it's been really quite an evolution for us, as a country. If you look at it from immediately after independence, in fact, even before independence, there was a fairly sharp realisation, at least, I would say, at a kind of elite level, at an intellectual level, that we have to rapidly gather technological strengths if we are to play catch up. That an independent India must have its own institutions, its own capabilities, it needs to build that. And to a large extent, that was very much the focus of what we did in the 40s and 50s and 60s. Now if you look at the perception on how we approached technology. In many ways, it was a sort of partly a partnership issue, a promotional issue, a liberating issue. We talked to different countries saying, let's partner, let's establish an institution or let's do a programme, or let's build a capacity. And a lot of our capacities came out of that. So when I looked, for example, at the foreign policy aspect of it, relationships and partnerships, were supposed to help us build more capabilities, sometimes, maybe we could have done in a more hard headed way, in a more outcome oriented way than we did. But that's a different issue.

Now, come into the 70s, especially after 1974, our first nuclear test now, then we got into a technology denial challenge, and how to deal with that became a problem almost an industry of its own. And with the passage of time, actually, it became a more and more constructive factor for us. So, if you look at the foreign policy side of how you approached the technology issues, it was like you are trying to break out of a set of barriers that had been erected. And, it obviously was something which had to be done by chipping away at various points of time, with different countries we have tried to different degrees. My own exposure, as you mentioned, one of the earliest things I was involved in was, at that time, how do we get dual use items from the United States, and this was the Reagan administration. So we did an agreement with the Americans in 1985. It was the first time this whole idea of end use visit technology controls, sensitivity about transfers, these were all new issues for us, which we addressed at that time. Also, at that time, we found a temporary fix for Tarapur, which had become an impasse in the 80s.

But thereafter, while we had a sort of a incremental progress, it was only in the next steps in strategic partnership (NSSP), that we really tried to make a quantum, which was done at the end of the century, actually early into the next century. And where really the argument was that on a basis of a strategic relationship or strategic argument, we were trying to persuade the United States to relax technology controls. And obviously, something as ambitious as this could not result in a comprehensive answer straight away. So we got enough of a breakthrough to then actually set up the nuclear deal a few years later. But with that, I would say, a combination of all of this, today, we once again, have a far more positive view of what technology offers in terms of foreign policy opportunities, foreign policy collaborations. But there is a new challenge today. And the challenge is very much more of technology and economies becoming very interpenetrating and interdependent. So this whole issue of trusted technologies, - is it trusted, is it transparent, is it reliable, is it resilient? So, I think we moved now, I would say, especially the last two, three years, into a very different phase. I think those earlier arguments are behind us, they are suddenly less and less relevant with the passage of time.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Suddenly, the period of isolation, denial actually made us very, very defensive. We saw that in the debate on the nuclear deal, the fear of opening up the fear of engagement. Now, we have transcended that phase and today, one can see there's a form of self-assurance in terms of how we deal with the technology issues. But one of the surprises of the nuclear deal negotiations was the Americans were batting for us, after leading the denial regime for so long. While the Chinese were really resisting India's integration into the global technological order. This is somewhat counterintuitive, right? We thought America was the problem and China was not. What you had, after the nuclear deal was really problems are elsewhere and your answers are somebody else.

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: Well, it depends on who you mean by we and therefore, for whom was it counterintuitive. I think those of us who saw the global currents change, who realised that United States was beginning to recalculate its relationships in the world and had discovered a certain value in the relationship with India. I think for them, it was not counter intuitive. I think they sensed it coming. They may not have, actually physically, completely visualised it. But that gut instinct was - something like this was not beyond the realm of imagination. I think those who were much more fixed or dogmatic in their view of the world, found it hard to do this. The second is, other than flexibility, those who looked at the world in terms of interests, who are very hard headed about it, versus those who had a more ideological or romantic view of the world. Who therefore felt, another big developing country has a natural identity of interest with us. If that country saw you for much of history in competitive terms, then this kind of, you can call it ideology, or, as I say, you can call it political romanticism, it can be very misleading. So, I would say, if you're hard headed, if you monitored global outcomes, if you actually looked at history and drew the right conclusions, to me what happened wasn't surprising. I mean, it went exactly as the analysis would tell you it would go.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Minister, you talked about in your opening remarks, the importance of partnerships today, as India steps out into the world. But there is a tension, right. I mean, between creating national capabilities, because without the national capabilities, you can't be much of a partner to anyone. And the other is the importance of partnerships in building your national capability. So it's a very, shall we say, a dialectical relationship between national capabilities and your international cooperation, but often it has been viewed as a competing objectives. That is, either you do only national development or you do only international cooperation. So how do you look at this tension? And how the government of India trying to resolve this tension?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister of India: That's actually a very, very good point, because I would regard this perception a national capabilities and partnerships or what people sometimes would say you're being protectionist versus globalised. The fact is, a country, the size of ours, with the potential that we have and the ambitions that we have, it cannot be that we don't have robust, reliable national capacities which are continuously upgraded. If you are open to a point where those capacities get hollowed out, which I would argue has happened to us, certainly for some part of this early part of this century, where our own industrial capacities have been allowed, in many ways to either not grow or not grow commensurately with the growth of the economy, it actually makes you a less effective player. I would argue that number one, the purpose of partnerships for us, is to increase capabilities, you don't do partnership for the sake of partnership. Secondly, the more capabilities you have, the more you are attractive as a partner. So the idea that you should be so open to the world, that other people can come and operate in your economy, on terms which are advantageous to them, because this is all supposed to be how our global economy works. I mean, to my mind is ridiculous. So I think we need to be clear that this is about building our strengths, deep strengths. People talk about supply chains, I would say, first of all, look at your domestic supply chain, that should be your first responsibility. So we need to continuously strengthen our domestic supply chain. We cannot have economic growth, without deep strengths and without commensurate employment growth. The jobless growth is not really growth, not certainly for a country like us. So I do believe very much that the focus should be about strengthening - it starts with education at a basic level, it goes on to skills, to talent, to start-up, to creating greater employment, to fostering a climate for growth of technology. To promote that, I don't think we should be defensive about it, the rest of the world is not.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Minister, you've talked about the changing approaches to globalisation that has begun to take place. It's certainly not just in India, but in the United States. And this also applies to the field of technology because just even three, four years ago, the idea of integration between Silicon Valley and (inaudible) was considered natural, and that you could distribute the technology production, depending on the efficiencies, etc, it didn't have to be within the national borders. But that approach has got a shock in recent years with the kind of weaponization of interdependence that China has done, and that we're seeing a backlash in the US and even in India's own approach, there is a big change. So when we now talk about as you mentioned, partnership with likeminded countries, are we talking about creating new groups that work together rather than this all-encompassing globalisation, which is taken advantage by one particular country?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: Well, look, Raj, in a way, I think, the big debate about globalisation is whether globalisation should be allowed to proceed, agnostic of everything else. The globalisation advocates, the great gurus pretend almost as though politics doesn't exist, we are all the same, nobody has an agenda, we are only there for more greater global economic activity. Now, reality has come back to bite all of them. Because the last few years’, people have had to accept that sorry, national competition, advancement of national ambitions, all these things are very much a reality despite economic globalisation. So, in a sense to me, the orthodox international relations with national competition, some people would argue even systemic competition has come into conflict with the mantras of globalisation where the virtues of it were so self-evident that we were supposed to keep everything else in abeyance. I think this is really the big debate which has unfolded, you can say in a way due to a set of actions-reactions kind of situation. So we are confronting today a very different world, politically.

Secondly, there was also an revisiting of the economic logic, because when different economies started shutting down or raising barriers last year, because of COVID, suddenly, we all woke up to the extent of our exposure. And then you have to ask yourself, should any country and that too, I'm now talking as a large country, are you actually risking your national security by having such a huge exposure to foreign sources, so that tomorrow, God forbids, something happens, you are totally stuck. So, I would say the big takeaway from the COVID, to me, is an argument for shorter supply chains, more national capacities. I mean, I've always felt, we have neglected the domestic supply chains and the deepest strengths. But put that aside for a moment. I do think, we've seen for example, even in health, years of a certain kind of economic logic caught us in a situation where we were unprepared with basics when the COVID hit us. And it has also shown today we have the capability. I mean, last two years, what we have done is actually incredible. I mean, it's incredible in terms of our health requirements, health infrastructure, vaccines, pharmaceutical needs, apart from the digitization, which has accompanied all of this. So I do see ourselves both politically because of a sharper national competition, as well as economically because of a more insecure world where your supply chains cannot be too radically exposed. I see us moving into a very different world.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: No, I think the quadrilateral forum, I mean, the Quad, as everyone calls it, one of the new foreign policy innovations that we've gotten into, and that is kind of jumped quite full into the whole question of what you mentioned just now, supply chains, vaccine production, critical technologies, and creating a range of groups and mechanisms within the framework. You think it is really aspirational at this stage? Or do you see significant progress taking place in these areas, and at the same time, while the China challenge has been meant for the pre-existing interdependence with China, among all the members of the quad, but also continues to constraints. So there is a problem of really shortening the supply chains, building collaboration among likeminded countries, given the scale and size of China, and its weight in the economies of all the quad countries?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister:
Well, let me take that if I can in two parts. One, are you asking me, Is the Quad aspirational? Or is it for real? I would say, I think the last year has shown it's very much for real. I would say if you have asked any of the four countries at the beginning of the year, would you anticipate achieving as much as we did during the year, are we surprised if any of them actually said yes. I think it's moved very, very effectively and to my mind, it has moved well, precisely because it is a very contemporary arrangement, that it is loose, it is creative, it is open minded, you know, you throw ideas, you like it, you pick up on it, you don't like it, you put it on the side, sometimes you revisit it. So it's a new way of working not just for us, I think even for the other three Quad partners that we have, they also were used much more to a more cumbersome, rigorous paper driven, document driven way of working. And if you look at the outcomes, the subjects really which Quad is looking at. These are really practical subjects which will make a difference, producing a vaccine, implementing a connectivity project, facilitating student mobility, looking at promoting start-ups and technology collaboration. So we've actually taken a very sensible view of the problems on the landscape and said, Okay, how do we four of us find a more effective solution.

Your other question, I know this word decoupling is a very fashionable word. I think anybody who's had serious business experience, would challenge that. Would challenge it because the reality is in a deeply interdependent, interpenetrated world. Decoupling is much easier said than done. I think that's a wrong description, because it misleads people on what to expect thereafter. Then they say, oh, that didn't happen, which means the whole idea is wrong. I think what you're going to see is not decoupling, what you are going to see to some extent is hedging, to some extent is de risking. So, you would have, as I said, multiple supply chains, shorter supply chains, more reliable supply chains, more transparent options. So, a lot of it will remain the same, very critical parts of it will change. It will not happen overnight, it will be evolutionary, it will be differentiated, it will be two steps forward, one step back half a step sideways, it will not be linear, it'll not be neat. But when the smoke clears, to the extent it does, I think you will see a different set of networks, which will be a kind of an overlay or an alternative or an additionality to what was there before.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Minister, one of the big changes in advanced technology production has been the dramatic expansion of the role of the private sector. In fact, the Bangalore place in the global digital expansion is itself self-evident, which is largely driven by the private sector. But even the rocket launches, which has been the last of the state monopolies, we're beginning to see NASA now handing over contracts to private launchers like SpaceX and others in the United States. But in India, the tech scene continues to be dominated by the state institutions, state labs, the government departments, if you will, but India has had a long tradition of private sector participation. In Bangalore the Indian Institute of Science was a private sector initiative. The Hindustan Aeronautics Limited was a private sector initiative. The Tata Institute of fundamental research in Mumbai was a private sector initiative. But yet over the decades, we become very state centred, state centric, and expecting the state to do everything. So how do you bring the private sector back in? And how do you produce a new synergy? The state still has to do the policies, but it is the private sector that has to invest more in technology, in R&D. So how do you bring that to bear?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: Well, you know, Raj to some degree, you're describing an internal variant of a problem, where, of course, external manifestation, you spoke about earlier, which is, if you have a very ideological view, where your preferences are very sharp, where you think of distribution before you think of production, where your sense of who are your partners is skewed less by outcome, outcome which would have been the right parameter or interest, then by a perception of some kind of common viewpoint. We are also I think, just as we have sought to de ideologies foreign policy, and come up with something much more pragmatic, much more calculated, much more driven, as I said, by national interest and outcomes. I think a similar sort of thought process is also unfolding and it has been unfolding over a period of time in India.

Now, the problem is it's much harder to do because it has expressed itself in very concrete projects and activities and investments and thought processes. But I would say if you look at the last few years, the fact that today, you have such a strong push for start-ups. The fact that even if you look at the digital world, the government is promoting the Digital India, not digital government India. So, now, it's not the government shouldn't be involved, I mean, after all, the digital tools are absolutely key to the quality of governance. So, everything which is good for business and for employment in India is also good for governance in India, and there will be certain areas which are very sensitive, in terms of national security, or which require such a big investment that only the state can do it. So you can't have a sort of one size fits all. But if you look at the trend line, I would argue that the trend line today is very much in the direction of greater entrepreneurship, far more sort of, respectful of talent, desirous of improving skills as a whole of encouraging people to stand up on their own feet. If you look even at who are role models, I would argue, that itself, tells you a lot. And some of the recent developments including the privatisation of Air India, I mean these are definitely big straws in the wind.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: There's a little bit of privatisation in space. One hopes more and more private sector participation in space will improve; the speculation on 5G, there's going to be a lot more participation in the private sector and on semiconductor production. Some of this big stuff, do we expect to see more privatisation beginning to happen in this sector, sir?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister:
Well, look, I don't know, I'm hesitant to predict that. I would rather give it to you as a, I think, thought process of a society. I mean, this is where I see Indian society going and I think if society goes that way, obviously, a lot of it is also very much a thought process within the government as well.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: One of the central themes of this GTS has been the global governance of technology, that India at one point was very critical to shaping the global landscape, go back to the 50s, and 60s. But then again, we moved into very ideological approach to global governance of technology in the 70s, and 80s. But today, are we ready to think of it far more practically, not sweeping internationalism, like general and complete dissolve, or saying, outer space belongs to the province of mankind, and to one where we say, Look, we're going to work in partners, we're going to set rules, rules that can be enforced, which is tempered by politics, geopolitics and national interest, are we making the transition in terms of how India contributes to global governance on technology, but at the same time, secures its own interests in a rapidly changing environment?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: Yes, I think we are. And, again, I would say we shouldn't necessarily think about it the way it would have been 20-30-40 years ago, I'll give you two examples. Two very interesting initiatives, one, the International Solar Alliance. Now, some years ago, we were seen as people who are very resistant to green technologies. Now, we have not only today become a sort of a landscape, or probably the sharpest growth in green energy in recent years. But we have actually become advocates, and in many ways organisers, and leaders of countries who wish to embrace more climate friendly technologies. And if you see what we have done in terms of the International Solar Alliance, the idea that India, of course, with other countries, some partners, the idea that we actually start an initiative, and we have today 100 members in that, and that this is an initiative, which addresses different aspects of promoting solar energy. And it's been really so effective across the world. Or if you look at the Coalition for Disaster Resilient infrastructure, the idea that look, we are vulnerable, we need to have the standards to prevent or address those vulnerabilities, again there is a very broad domain out there, where you done it in a way, you tried to co-opt and carry along as many countries for a set of issues, which are very, very important to the world. So, I put those to you, because, the way people look at Quad sometimes in terms of politics, to me, these are now the initiatives of the day, they are voluntary, they are not onerous, they are very participatory. I mean, there isn't one or two countries which sort of seek to lay out the rules for everybody else, it is like a coming together. And they're actually very effective on the ground, as well. So, I think the technology conversations that I see, because we have actually started seeing also now countries in groups, smaller groups, discuss the need for reliable and resilient supply chains. So you're going to see this, you're going to see this sometimes as a specialised group, sometimes it can be a topic of another combination of countries. So I mean, if you look at this new group, which we have started to explore now, India, Israel, UAE and the United States, some part of it certainly to my mind will be technology focus, because these four countries, if you look at them, whether it's in digital, whether it's in green technologies, whether it's in start-up and innovation, each of them is very different, but all four actually have great strengths and a very strong record in those areas.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Minister we have taken a lot of your time, but I just had a couple of more questions. So when we think of technology, we talk about it as growth, about economics, about development. But today we talk about how technology can transform democracy or undermine democracy. This is a thought the Prime Minister Modi democracy Summit, earlier this week was talking about it that how do we deal with the dangers that the digital domain now poses to democracy? And what kind of rules can be set among democracies? This issue came up in the G8 summit earlier this year, and it's going to be a running theme, how do you summarise India's approach to this?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister : Well, the Prime Minister spoke yesterday at the Democracy Summit and obviously, some of it, as you mentioned, he touched on it. I'll just offer you two thoughts. One, a point which the Prime Minister made very forcefully yesterday, which is that technology today is a critical tool to deliver on democratic governance and it's important in democracy is not to be cynical, either about democracy or about governance. And I would say, today, in India, we have got far more serious, far more contentious about governance and therefore about delivery. And I think the fact that, it's an interesting cycle because there is technology, people have greater aspirations, because they have aspirations, your delivery has to be better, because your delivery is better, their aspirations go higher. So, technology becomes a very interesting driver of good governance, of democratic governance, of effective democracy. If you look today, at the integrity of democratic processes, which, in many countries there are debates about it. At least one thing in India, we should say, I mean, we're not just proud of our democracy, we also have reason to be proud about the various processes of democracy, and many of which actually have a technology backbone to them. So I think as I said, look, every technology can be used or misused. That's up to us. In democracy, they're more likely to be well used, properly used. So I see them as overall asset to democracy. But I'm aware that there is a potential for misuse. It's something which, all good democracies should, I mean eternal vigilance being a prized freedom, I think, monitoring, and safeguarding and properly applying technologies is also very much part of how democracies sort of nurture themselves. And I do believe that's also a very legitimate debate in a democracy.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: So one final question, I mean, on the India's tech diaspora, that the Indian talent, I mean, there's constant news of how well the Indian trained engineers and, you know, from our IITs, from our scientific institutions are shaping the global technology scene and your own government now, there's so much emphasis on promoting mobility of talent across borders. So this raises, two interesting sets of issues. One is, do we keep them at home, there was a point at which we said, look, brain drain is bad and let's limit our flow of technological talent outside but today we're approaching it that it is Brain Gain, actually, Indian engineers around the world can also bring in benefits so what is the broad view we have. And second meanwhile, there is a growing demand for technology talent. Today, Britain, US follow trends and partners who talk about their need to put technology at the centre of economic growth, national security, they're looking for personal people, and your government has talked about, India as a reservoir of talent. So, there is demand there is, you know India has huge potential to supply. But how do we leverage this, that the enormous human reservoir and technology talent that you have, while at the same time using it to strengthen ourselves that really, for example, today with Britain or somewhere when you talked about innovation and other partnerships, how do we work to strengthen our own advance while actually contributing to global technological development by our diaspora?

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: You know, Raj, historically, all countries have seen the world as a global marketplace. I mean, you go back in time, the moment any society gets a little prosperous, has surpluses, has needs, which are not made there, they start trading. And with the passage of time, the importance of the global marketplace has grown. I think what distinguishes us is we are quite unique, not absolutely singular, but relatively unique in being a major stakeholder in a global workplace. So it's not just a marketplace for us, it's also a work place. And the foreign policy of such a country should reflect that. By the way the domestic policies of country should also reflect that. So at home, if you've seen particularly in the last few years, just greater emphasis on education, on literacy, on education, on human development, on health, on gender balance, on meeting your sustainable development goals, then on skilling, then on secondary- tertiary education, more universities, more technical schools, more medical schools, then on start-ups, then making it easier to do business, it's a chain out there. So what you're trying to do is really, from bottom up, you're actually trying to enhance and improve the quality of your HR so that in a global workplace and a global marketplace, because the two are less and less separable, you become a more and more effective player.

Now, how does it work abroad? I would say it's reflected in a whole set of changed priorities. Again, it starts right at home, we've made it so much easier today to issue passports, because in the old days, I mean, forget about going out, getting a passport was a nightmare. I mean, you and I belong to a generation, which has seen that, how long it took for people to get a passport. Now, today, in most places in India, I mean, you can walk into many post offices and go fill in your passport application. So it starts from there, then you look at people who have already gone abroad, protection measures for them, welfare measures for them. We are today trying to negotiate migration and mobility agreements with a lot of countries, because we want legal movement of people. Because our people should not be left vulnerable in the global workplace. So the moment you think of the world, as a workplace with the HR, actually as your strength globally, let me tell you, the world looks very different. And your policies have to then adjust to serve that world. And I would suggest to you a large part of what we have done is not only to promote basic strengths at home, to make the country more aware of the importance of technology and the value of innovation, but also to ensure that these become very effective instruments of our foreign policy and global influence. So it's a kind of a package, a worldview, if you would and it is that very worldview with which actually, we started the global technology summits.

C. Raja Mohan, founding director of Carnegie India: Minister, you have been very patient. You covered a lot of ground and you gave us a comprehensive answers. Thank you. Thank you for taking this GTS 6th version. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Jaishankar.

Dr. S. Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister: Thank you. Thank you. Pleasure.

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