Sydney-based think tank Lowy Institute has recently released their Asia Power Index 2021 and ranked India as the fourth most powerful country in Asia, amongst the 26 countries and territories as listen under the Indo-Pacific Region. The country lost its growth potential for being the third-largest economy in the region largely given the devastating impact the pandemic and the subsequent lockdown had on the economic growth and the diminished impact is predicted to be as long as 2030, the report says.
India’s Point Reports
India is third in future resources measure, only behind USA and China. The pandemic has weakened the comprehensive power of almost all states, affecting their attributes like the capacity to respond, shape their external environment, etc. In their comparison, India has done well in areas of resilience and military capability in 2021, despite being one of the hardest hit by the pandemic. In terms of points rating by the Index, India gained (+1.7) ‘resilience’ and (+0.5) points improvement in ‘military capability’. But, there were also significant drops in the parameters of ‘cultural influence’ (−7.9), ‘economic relationships’ (−5.1), ‘diplomatic influence’ (−2.4), ‘defence networks’ (−2.1), and ‘economic capability’ (−1.3) when compared to the pre-pandemic situations.
India also had a negative power gap score, which reflected that it exerted less influence in the region and is ranked lower than Sri Lanka and Nepal in the power gap index. Though it retained the 7th position in defense networks following initiatives like the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue with Australia, Japan, and the USA, India continues to trend in an opposite direction for its two weakest measures of power, according to the report by the institute.
Increased Influence of US and China
Falling further behind in its regional trade integration efforts, the country lags in economic diplomacy and economic relationships as it is falling behind relative to its resources and potential and finishing 8th, after Thailand. The report estimates that India’s ambition to be a multi-polar power and match China on military and economic grounds will take a decade-long effort and then also with no guarantee of success still. By the end of the current decade, the reach will only be an estimated 40 percent of China’s economic output on current trends.
The report on the Indo-Pacific region also reflects the dominance of the two superpowers of the US and China exerts on the region, due to which it is becoming increasingly bipolar. The main reason behind this is that the two countries with the most potential in the reason – India and Japan are lagging behind China and each has lost more than China in 2021. Another key component – Australia is too dependant on the United States, along with the trend that Washington has expanded influence and power in the region through diplomacy with alliances like the QUAD while Beijing’s have receded and the pandemic has turned it more inward.
