In a veiled dig at Maldives President Mohamad Muizzu, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has said that "big bullies don't provide $4.5 billion aid" when neighbouring countries are in distress, in response to a question about whether India was being perceived as a "bully" in the region.
Jaishankar's remark came after Muizzu, in an indirect reference to India, said in January that no country had the licence to "bully us", even though it was a tiny nation, amid a diplomatic tussle between both countries.
Speaking at an event while promoting his book 'Why Bharat Matters', Jaishankar stressed India's active role in providing timely assistance to its neighbours during crises when asked whether New Delhi was perceived as a "bully" in the subcontinent and Indian Ocean region, news agency ANI reported.
"The big change today in this part of the world is what has happened between India and its neighbours. When you say India is perceived as a big bully, you know, big bullies don't provide $4.5 billion when the neighbours are in trouble. Big bullies don't supply vaccines to other countries when Covid-19 is on or make exceptions to their own rules to respond to food demands or fuel demands or fertiliser demands because some war in some other part of the world has complicated their lives," Jaishankar said at the event on Saturday (March 2).
The minister's comments amid the diplomatic row between India and Maldives that began in January when three Maldivian ministers were suspended for their derogatory remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi after he posted pictures of his visit to Lakshadweep while pitching the Union Territory as a tourist destination.
"You also have to look today at what has actually changed between India and its neighbours. Certainly, with Bangladesh and Nepal, today you have a power grid. You have roads which didn't exist a decade ago. You have railways which didn't exist a decade ago. There is a usage of waterways. Indian businesses use ports of Bangladesh on a national treatment basis," Jaishankar was quoted by ANI as saying.
He stressed that trade and investment with Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Bangladesh and the Maldives have seen a sharp rise over the past few years.
"Today, at the connectivity (side), just the volume of people is moving up and down. The volume of the trade and the investments which are there, it's actually a very good story to tell. Not just with Nepal and Bangladesh, with Sri Lanka as well, I would also say even with the Maldives," the minister said.
"And (in the case of) Bhutan, I don't want to miss them out because they have just been consistently strong partners. So, our problem in the neighbourhood, very honestly, is with respect to one country. In diplomacy, you always hold out hopes that, yes, okay, keep at it and who knows one day what the future holds," he said.
On February 5, Muizzu said that the first group of Indian military personnel will be sent back from the island nation before March 10, while the remaining Indian troops manning two aviation platforms will be withdrawn by May 10.
The Maldivian President, widely seen as a pro-China leader, had said that the target was to lead the island nation to the point of having no foreign military presence in the country.
