India has been a strong supporter of the multilateral way, and Prime Minister Modi had advised Amitabh Kant, India’s G-20 sherpa, that we must get a consensus declaration in 2023
G-20 or Group of 20 is a multilateral body of both rich and emerging economies, which include the European Union and the African Union (since 2023). It deliberates through leaders summits annually on current issues of global economic governance. This book is about the unprecedented success of the G-20 summit in New Delhi in September, 2023
By various accounts, G-20 is the best multilateral forum in the world. Its decisions are widely debated though these are optional for the international community and countries to adopt. Alas, since the Russia-Ukraine conflict its deliberations have been wrought in controversy. A difficult consensus was reached at the Bali, Indonesia, summit in 2022. One of the factors in this rapprochement was the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s sanguine advice: “This is not an era of war.”
India has been a strong supporter of the multilateral way, and Prime Minister Modi had advised Amitabh Kant, India’s G-20 sherpa, that we must get a consensus declaration in 2023.
This book is the result of the sterling work done by Amitabh and his team in pushing the G-20 membership to agree to a consensus declaration. In spite of having no prior experience of international negotiations, Amitabh steered the deliberations brilliantly by cleverly using non-controversial issues as the priority topics for the G-20 process.
Recalls Amitabh in the book: “Just as India’s top diplomats continued to work tirelessly behind the scenes to find a middle ground between Russia and the US, a defining moment in the G-20 presidency came when Sergey Lavrov (Russian foreign minister) penned a letter to S. Jaishankar (India’s foreign minister). underscoring the challenges that threatened to unravel the G-20’s delicate consensus-based negotiations”.
This captured the push given by Amitabh in the deliberations so that contentious issues do not block progress. He says, it took more than “200 hours of non-stop negotiations” to deliver a consensus on the G-20 declaration that was adopted at the summit in New Delhi, which included the geopolitical paras (Russia-Ukraine)”.
In terms of tactics, as one example, Amitabh wrote to all the country sherpas in early June, that “my leader has directed me to convince all G-20 countries that we need to work for a consensus so that key development challenges are addressed”. This early positive mantra coupled with support from all the Global South members in the G-20 group enabled the consensus draft declaration.
For his can-do qualities, I have always called him Amitabh Adrenaline Kant. He is intelligently gung-ho which can be quite effective. With optimism, he can convince even opponents to arrive at a win-win situation.
The writer is secretary-general, CUTS International and member, B20 India Council for Africa’s Economic Integration
How India scaled Mt G-20
By Amitabh Kant
Rupa
pp. 256; Rs 595
