Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'India deserves to be a permanent member of UNSC' that was published in Newsband

India deserves to be a permanent member of UNSC

India won the unanimous endorsement of the 55-nation Asia-Pacific Group at the United Nations Security Council in its quest for a non-permanent seat for 2021-22. India was the sole candidate for the post. In the next step, all 193 members of the UN General Assembly will vote for five non-permanent seats in June 2020, when India will need to show the support of at least 129 countries to go through to the UNSC. It will then occupy the seat at the UNSC for a two-year period, as it has previously on seven occasions since 1950-51.

India has a unique role to play at the UNSC with the U.S., the U.K. and France on one side, and Russia and China on the other. India’s ability to work with both sides is well known.

Since 2013, when it first announced the bid, the government has run a quiet but consistent campaign towards this goal. India will have to work out a comprehensive strategy for what it plans to do with the seat. In the past, India has earned a reputation for ‘fence-sitting’ by abstaining on votes. The seat will be a chance to undo that image.

Given the challenges of a rising China, India will have to act tough. This is a major diplomatic win and testament to India’s global stature, unanimously endorsed by the 55-member Asia-Pacific grouping, including China and Pakistan.

The 10 non-permanent seats are distributed on a regional basis: five for African and Asian States; one for Eastern European States; two for the Latin American and Caribbean States; and two for Western European and other States.

Previously, India has been elected as a non-permanent member of the Council for the years 1950—1951, 1967—1968, 1972—1973, 1977—1978, 1984—1985, 1991—1992 and most recently in 2011—2012 under the leadership of former Ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri.

India has been at the forefront of the years-long efforts to reform the Security Council. But it is just 55 out of 195 countries, it's not even 50 percent. Modi traveled across more than 63 countries in last five years tenure. What’s the use?

China was already a UNSC permanent member at the time of Nehru. America was trying (or thinking) to replace China or possibly just lure India. Nehru spoilt the show. Nehru did not want India out but he wanted the "sixth" seat. The permanent seat was offered to India which Nehru gave to China without thinking about its importance. After giving to them they attacked and occupied lot of land.  One should blame Nehru alone for '62 War and Kashmir dispute.

The United Nations Security Council has emerged as the key arena and barometer for evaluating the promise and progress of accommodating new, rising powers in the international system. The case of India provides one of the best examples of a rising power coming to terms with its increased power, role and expectations of itself and of other powers, great and small, in negotiating its place in the reformed Council as a permanent member. India has been strategizing over the years to gain permanent seat in the reformed Council.

India has been elected for seven terms for a two-year non-permanent member seat, the last being 2011-12, only behind Japan, Brazil and Argentina. Except for the first time, when India held the seat earmarked for the Commonwealth group, it has held the seat on every other occasion on behalf of the Asian group.

India won the non-permanent seat with the highest number of votes in the General Assembly showing its impressive electoral popularity. It needs to be recalled that not long ago in 1996, India had lost the elections to Japan by a wide margin for a non-permanent seat.

India’s rising economic stature globally has added to Indian claims as well. India is now the fastest-growing major economy in the world, and Asia’s third largest. India is now counted amongst the most influential players in economic organizations like the WTO, BRICS and the G20. India’s newly acquired status as a Nuclear Weapons State (NWS) in May 1998 also makes India a natural claimant as a permanent member similar to the existing permanent members who are all Nuclear Weapon States.

The seat on the high table, at the UN’s premier, powerful body would provide it the much needed leverage to expand its geo-political and geo-economic clout globally. It would serve as an equalizer to China, its rival and an emerging hegemon in Asia and an ever increasing strategic and security concern in its immediate neighborhood and beyond. India has always seen itself as a democratic alternative to the authoritarian China in a leadership role in Asia. India’s millennia old civilizational existence also demands it to be at the top of international hierarchy of states.