Narendra Modi set to visit Singapore and Brunei after ministerial roundtable in island nation
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Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to visit Singapore and Brunei in September, following the bilateral talks at the second India-Singapore Ministerial Roundtable (ISMR), held on August 26.
Several media reports attributed to Singapore Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan, who was part of ISMR 2024, a prediction that the Modi visit would happen “soon”.
The Indian business daily The Economic Times quoted Balakrishnan as saying in Singapore that the “productive” ministerial roundtable preceded an official visit to Singapore by PM Modi.
“We are also working on all this because very shortly, we will be announcing an Official Visit by Prime Minister Modi to Singapore as well. I cannot give you the specific date, but it will occur shortly,” Balakrishnan was quoted as saying in ET.
ISMR 2024 in Singapore followed ISMR 2022 in New Delhi. The Indian delegation comprised External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar; Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman; Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal; and Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw. The delegation called on Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and Prime Minister Lawrence Wong.
The latest ISMR has paved the way for Modi’s visit to Singapore in September 2024, which would come almost exactly a year after former Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s trip to India in September 2023 for the G20 Summit.
While the Indian prime minister has won a record third term in office, Singapore now has a new “4G” leader in Prime Minister and Finance Minister Lawrence Wong.
In a video interview published on Instagram, Minister Balakrishnan said that Singapore had “much to gain” by working together with India.
He said, “We just had a very productive, efficient meeting of the India-Singapore Ministerial Roundtable. Let’s start with why India. First, India has now become the most populous country in the world. India is now the fifth largest GDP in the world; [it] recently overtook the UK. And, in fact, if the projections pan out, India would be the third largest GDP in the world by the end of this decade.”
The Singapore minister continued, “India is also an integral economic partner for ASEAN and obviously for Singapore as well. If you look at the economic figures, in the last two decades, trade with India has gone up by two-and-a-half times. And more recently, those trade numbers are also trending up significantly. ”
“And,” he said, “I would add, also, investments, both ways — in particular, Singapore is the largest foreign investor in India, so we have skin in the game as well, and we certainly have much to gain, as the Indian economy develops, increases in sophistication, and increases its global dominance. So, that’s why this [ISMR] meeting is important.”
In a related report, The New Indian Express said: “Advanced manufacturing, semiconductors as well as aviation maritime connectivity are the new areas that were added to the ISMR [2024].”
The news daily added: “Singapore has been a major source of [Foreign Direct Investment] in India. In 2023-24, Singapore’s FDI for India was estimated at USD 11.77 billion in inflows. The cumulative inflow of FDI from Singapore from April 2000 to March 2024 was USD 159.94 billion.”
Some India-Singapore trade figures published recently by the India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF), which describes itself as “a Trust established by the Department of Commerce, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India”, are as follows:
- India was Singapore’s 12th largest trade partner, for the year 2021-22 with a share of 2.3 per cent in Singapore’s overall trade.
- Singapore is India’s 8th largest trade partner and largest trade partner in ASEAN.
- Bilateral trade stood at USD 35.58 billion in 2022-23, displaying a growth of 18 per cent over 2021-22.
- Singapore is the 2nd largest investor in India, with a cumulative FDI inflow of USD 153.39 billion from April 2000-September 2023.
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