‘How India scaled Mt. G20’ – A Review – Indian Blog of International Law

Aman Kumar

Introduction

As an Indian student of international law, one craves to read books written by Indians on international law events either involving India or Indians. So far, there is a dearth of such books. While the Indian diplomats have occupied this space, their works have been more about diplomacy than about law. Such is the state of affairs in Indian academia or practice that one of India’s most celebrated judges—Judge Radhabinod Pal—hasn’t found a worthy biographer in Indians. That’s why when I saw Amitabh Kant’s How India scaled Mt G20: The Inside Story of The G20 Presidency I was excited. The Indian government left no stone unturned in promoting its G20 presidency, much like what it did with its presidency of UNSC (2021 and 2022), an otherwise routine affair. Getting these presidencies require almost zero effort, quite unlike the Indian candidate’s election to the ICJ. But at that time the current regime didn’t engage much with the ICJ, hence that event wasn’t sold to the masses as was the case with G20. So, I picked Kant’s book with great enthusiasm. As a book on G20, written by India’s sherpa when India was hosting the event, I was filled with anticipation to read the background negotiations on international law. Here, I present (with courage) my (hard-hitting) review of the book.

Book’s organization

Kant has presented his ‘inside story’ of India’s G20 presidency in 8 chapters, a Prologue, an Epilogue and a Postscript. These chapters have some stories which can be called ‘inside stories’, but mostly contain information which are readily available, courtesy the grand scale of promotion and coverage of the events in the Indian media. There are pages dedicated to explaining the symbolism of hosting a particular meeting in a particular city, or how a particular event resonated with the struggles of negotiations etc. It’s not clear who Kant’s intended reader is, but it’s clear that the book caters to members of ‘Modi ka Parivar’. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the words ‘PM Modi’ appear on almost every page of the book, and this would not have been an issue if Kant had not written an entire chapter on Modi – the last chapter of the book is titled ‘Leadership in Action: What I learned from PM Modi’. However, the saving grace is the fact that at almost no place does Kant seem to appreciate Modi out of obligation. Either Kant is a really good writer, or he is genuinely impressed with what he saw of Modi during his term as India’s G20 Sherpa.

Missing Ministers

What makes Kant’s adulation of Modi troublesome though is the absolute absence of any other minister in the book. There are references to MEA Mr. Jaishankar and how his inputs and interventions were crucial, and there is a reference to MoF Ms. Sitharaman and how she was instrumental in leading some of the discussions on finance. Barring these two, no one seems to be involved in any discussions, if one has to go by this insider story, and that’s what surprises me. (Kant feels fortunate that during his JNU days, he shared the same floor of his hostel with Mr. Jaishankar!)

Kant informs us that ‘India more than delivered on its agenda’ by having 118 Annexed documents to the final New Delhi Leaders Declaration (NDLD). Considering the breadth of the issues covered in these annexes, it’s curious how none of the ministers seemed to have contributed anything to the G20. Kant, to his credit, mentions by name all of his team members and the other sherpas and diplomats he worked with during his tenure. And these mentions are not always customary, for he also tells us how those people helped him or contributed towards the overall success of India’s presidency. This makes the absence of other central ministers in the book even glaring. For example, what was the contribution of Mr. Narendra Singh Tomar (the then Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare) when the G20 members were discussing on the agricultural issues, or of Mr. Hardeep Singh Puri (the then Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas). Women Empowerment (or Naari Shakti as Kant reminds us) was one of the main agendas of India’s presidency – and yet Ms. Smriti Zubin Irani, the then Minister of Women and Child Development, is absent from the book. However, two of the most shocking absences from the book have to be of Mr. Bhupender Yadav (the then Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change) and Mr. Piyush Goyal (the then Minister of Commerce and Industry), considering the importance Kant himself has given to the topics of climate change and commerce.

Missing international law

My sole interest in the book was from the perspective of international law. It was going to be a first-hand account of negotiations on issues of importance to international law and naturally I was drawn to the book. Alas, the book disappoints. The disappointment is hard to digest because very early in the book Kant tells us that his role required ‘an intimate knowledge of treaties and past declarations’. This teaser was supposed to be followed by discussions on international law and treaty interpretation, but what follows is the oft repeated rhetoric of UN Charter Principles. Beyond this, the only semblance of international law is when Kant tells us how his tenure taught him the importance of terms like ‘noting’, ‘emphasizing’, ‘reaffirming’ or ‘recalling’, the usual terms of any UN document.

The only three chapters worthy of being in the book (and of your time) are chapters 4, 5 and 6. If you skip the remaining parts, you wouldn’t have missed much. Chapter 1 gives us a basic introduction of G20, nothing you won’t find on G20’s Wikipedia page. I was expecting Kant to give us a nuanced take on the institution, or present India’s view on it, probably mix it with Kant’s experience at NITI Aayog (Hindi version of erstwhile Planning Commission), but those expectations are unmet. Kant writes that “(o)ur analytical work revealed that the structures in place—designed primarily by and for the interest of developed countries—failed to provide adequate support or resources for those of us in the emerging economies”. But he doesn’t cite these analytical works. Moreover, since these works were conducted at NITI Aayog when Kant was its CEO, they probably date somewhere between 2016-2022. One wonders if they read or referred to works of Prof. B S Chimni who had longed critiqued IOs as imperial tools. Chimni had even called G20 an ‘oligarchic body’. We don’t know if the policy makers engaged with Chimni’s works, or the iron wall continues to exist between policy makers and academicians.

On China

The part in third chapter on gender equality is almost entirely about Modi’s domestic policies for women. One fails to understand its place in a book about G20. Kant fails to make the connection, if that exists. This is in sharp contrast to chapter 6 where Modi’s domestic policies regarding India’s digital transformation are discussed, along with the role private actors played in it, and this discussion is situated properly with India’s agenda for G20. Kant’s narration of domestic policies blends perfectly with what India wanted to achieve through this G20 meeting with other developed and emerging markets, especially Africa.

India’s push for inclusion of names of these domestic polices faced pushback from China, tells Kant. LiFe (Lifestyle for Environment) was a term India (almost desperately) wanted included in the NDLD. Kant tells us that they tried various iterations of it – Lifestyles for Sustainable Development, LiFE in brackets after Lifestyles for Sustainable Development, LiFEstyles for Sustainable Development. However, India faced opposition because of the terminology, not because of the content. The final NDLD has the term LiFE, but Kant doesn’t tell us how they managed to convince China to keep it in the final draft.

Another bit about terminology is about paragraph 3 of the Preamble of NDLD. It reads:

“G20 cooperation is essential in determining the course the world takes. Headwinds to global economic growth and stability persist. Years of cascading challenges and crises have reversed gains in the 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)…. Rising commodity prices, including food and energy prices are contributing to cost of living pressures.” [emphasis mine]

Kant tells us that Saudi Arabia was opposed to the term ‘crisis’ and wanted to use ‘challenge’ instead. The presence of both these words is a result of compromise. Similarly, there was disagreement on usage of the term rising energy prices, since some countries insisted that high inflation was a consequence of rising energy ‘commodity prices’, writes Kant. As a student of international law, it is these bits that are significant. Why a particular term is included in a text and what it might mean is extremely significant. Kant seems aware of this because of the way he tries to justify Saudi Arabia’s position, but in the very next paragraph he flips and writes that ‘(m)ultilateral documents are often a chore to read, filled with convoluted language that obscures their true meaning. I often urged delegates to cut the fluff.’ Considering India’s own experience with language of international law, especially in the field of climate change, one can’t be more careful. Kant himself provides an example for this. Paragraph 41 of the NDLD reads:

“Note the need of USD 5.8-5.9 trillion in the pre-2030 period required for developing countries, in particular for their needs to implement their NDCs, as well as the need of USD 4 trillion per year for clean energy technologies by 2030 to reach net zero emissions by 2050.” [Emphasis mine]

Kant tells us how some ‘English-speaking countries’ (he could have been more specific here) suggested changing ‘required for developing countries’ to ‘required in developing countries’. As Kant notes, this would have completely shifted the burden of funding onto developing countries.

On Russia

Russian President Mr. Valdimir Putin didn’t attend the G20 meeting in Delhi. However, this wasn’t the first time Putin had skipped a multilateral meeting. While some say that Putin has not attended these meeting because of the ongoing war with Ukraine, I believe the arrest warrant issued against him by the International Criminal Court (ICC) has a big role to play in it. Putin, though, is slated to visit Delhi this year and it would be interesting to see if there are any pressures on India regarding his arrest. When the then Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir had visited India in 2016, with a similar arrest warrant hanging over his head, the ICC had asked India to arrest and surrender him to it. India had then declined to do so since it is not a member of the ICC. Even now, should Putin visit India, India won’t be under any legal obligation to arrest him for the ICC.

Putin absence though might have been in India’s favour. As Kant tells us in his book, USA and Russia (along with China) disagreed over the inclusion of Ukraine related paragraphs in the NDLD. Kant’s narration of the events, which he calls ‘Geopolitics’ paragraphs of the NDLD, is very good. He highlights how discussions over geopolitics hijacked other topics too, and how his team had to struggle to keep things on track. It’s now a known fact that the Zelensky threat worked to get Russia’s support, but what transpired behind the scenes is worth reading.

The Good

The best part about the book are the chapters on ‘Geopolitics’ (Chapter 5) and ‘Digital Transformation’ (Chapter 6). These are the bits, especially chapter 6, which can truly be called inside story. The tussle between G7 on one hand and Russia and China on the other hand about references to the Ukraine war is narrated beautifully by Kant. How Kant and his team managed to revise the Bali G20 leaders declaration, and include it in the NDLD is worth a read. And even though chapter 6 looks more like Kant’s own take on Digital Transformation, it presents a nice link between India’s own digital journey and its advocacy of digital transformation in G20.

Same is true for Kant’s take on Multilateralism, a topic discussed briefly in chapter 1, but has an entire Postscript dedicated to it. Similarly, discussions on India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, Global Biofuel Alliance and SDG finance get a brief, but enriching discussion. These mostly have Kant’s take on them instead of what transpired in the negotiations at the G20, but are worth a read.

Conclusion

The leaf of Kant’s book reads – ‘what every Indian needs to know about India’s moment on the global stage is in this book.’ I am not so sure if every Indian needs to know about this G20, but even otherwise, the book doesn’t deliver on this promise. One frustrating example is this – Kant writes that even though India’s priorities were welcomed, there were challenges too. But then, he devotes the next 7 paragraphs to mentioning the symbolism of saafa, mundu, chundan vallam!

Similarly there are mentions of ‘Blended financing’, ‘circular carbon economy’, ‘sovereign green bond’ but they don’t get enough space in the book which is frustrating because some of these terms have ended up in the NDLD. As such, it would have been beneficial to read how Kant and his team went about negotiating on those terms.

Two of the most significant achievements of this G20 were inclusion of the African Union in G20 (and Kant reminds us that it was a result of Modi’s Guarantee) and inclusion of Modi’s call – ‘Today’s era must not be of war’ (it was also there in the 2022 Bali leaders’ declaration and was removed from the 2024 Rio de Janeiro Leaders’ Declaration). Kant’s book should have elaborated more on the call considering its significance.

‘The narrative of India is no longer one of potential, but one of realization’, writes Kant at the end of his first chapter. Sadly, Kant’s book has potential but fails to realize that potential.