India’s Industry Helps Open Door to World

The New York Times

Sunday, April 01, 2012

India’s Industry Helps Open Door to World

By JIM YARDLEY

LAHORE, Pakistan — On the day the Indian trade delegation came across the border, Pakistan was having another political crisis. The prime minister was embroiled in a showdown with the country’s Supreme Court. Early elections were rumored. And Islamists had just staged a rally in Karachi to protest “foreign intervention” on Pakistani soil.

Not, perhaps, the perfect moment to hammer out closer trade ties.

Yet Rajiv Kumar, a leader of the Indian delegation, was pleased. It was mid-February, and his business group was staging the first Indian trade show ever held in Pakistan. Tens of thousands of visitors would attend during three days. And Indian and Pakistani business leaders, as well as both countries’ commerce ministers, swapped cards, sipped tea and feasted at lavish banquets. “Look at this!” Mr. Kumar exclaimed as his car rolled up to the convention center here in Lahore, where crowds were thronging for the trade show. “My God! Quite good, I’d say.”

One truism about the tortured relationship between India and Pakistan is that there is never a perfect moment. For six decades, through three wars and one nuclear standoff, diplomats have tried, and failed, to improve relations. Now, the private sector is giving it a shot. Trade has become the most promising opening in the latest round of diplomacy, as progress remains largely stalled on tough issues like terrorism, water rights and the status of Kashmir.

The foray into Pakistan is further proof of the increasingly important role of India’s private sector in foreign policy. India’s leaders, eager for a bigger footprint in global affairs, now aspire to a permanent seat on an expanded United Nations Security Council. But the Indian Foreign Service, though consisting of top-notch officers, is too understaffed to provide a comprehensive global presence.

To compensate, the government often relies on the private sector to serve as an intermediary abroad. India’s two leading business groups — C.I.I. (the Confederation of Indian Industry) and Ficci (the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry) — now have offices around the world and sponsor informal diplomatic dialogues between India and countries like Japan, China, Singapore and the United States.