It gives me immense pleasure to share my thoughts on this very important occasion of India’s 75th Republic Day. As we celebrate yet another milestone in India’s journey as a Republic, it is a reminder of the values and principles on which India was built.
India and Egypt, two of the world’s oldest civilizations, have always enjoyed a history of close contacts from ancient times. Ashoka’s edicts refer to his relations with Egypt under Ptolemy-II in 3rd century B.C. In modern times, Mahatma Gandhi and Saad Zaghloul shared common goals on the independence of their countries. The exceptionally close friendship between President Gamal Abdel Nasser and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru led to a Friendship Treaty between the two countries in 1955. India and Egypt share close political understanding, based on a long history of interaction and close cooperation in bilateral, regional and global issues. Both countries, inspired by their civilizational values, espoused the ideals of right to self-determination, anti-colonialism, national independence and peaceful co-existence that were indeed the founding principles of the ‘Non-Aligned Movement’.
The political leadership of both the countries has consistently nurtured friendship between our two countries. Although there was a brief gap in physical interaction due to Covid-19 pandemic, Ministerial visits resumed with the visit of India’s Defence Minister, Shri Rajnath Singh to Egypt from 18-21 September 2022. This was soon followed by the visit of External Affairs Minister, Dr. S. Jaishankar to Egypt from 14-16 October 2022. Minister of Environment, Forests & Climate Change, Shri Bhupendra Yadav also led a senior Indian delegation for CoP-27 at Sharm El-Sheikh in November 2022. All these Ministerial visits laid the foundation for the unprecedented momentum in India-Egypt bilateral relations witnessed in 2023.
I now take this opportunity to share with you some glimpses of India-Egypt relations in the year just gone by. President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi paid his 2nd State Visit to India from 24-27 January 2023 as the Chief Guest for India’s 74th Republic Day celebrations. This was the first time ever that President of Egypt was visiting India as Chief Guest for Republic Day. Within a short span of less than 6 months, Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi paid his first-ever State Visit to Egypt from 24-25 June 2023. Prime Minister Modi and President Sisi discussed ways to further deepen bilateral cooperation as envisioned in the ‘Strategic Partnership Agreement’ signed during the visit. One of the highlights of the visit was bestowal of Egypt’s highest civilian honour the “Order of the Nile” on PM Modi by President Sisi. President Sisi visited India for the second time in 2023 to participate in the ‘G20 New Delhi Summit’ from 09-10 September 2023. Egypt’s PM Mostafa Madbouly and FM Sameh Shoukry, also participated virtually in the “Voice of the Global South Summit”, organized by India on 17 November 2023. Year 2023 was a very active year, as it witnessed about 11 Ministerial visits from Egypt to India.
In the field of commerce and trade, Egypt has traditionally been one of the most important trading partners of India in Africa. Our bilateral trade has grown more than 5 times in the last ten years. The bilateral trade expanded by 75% to record an all time high of US$ 7.26 billion in FY 2021-22. Our bilateral trade was approximately US$ 6 bn during FY 2022-23, thereby making India Egypt’s sixth largest trading partner. Around 50 Indian companies have a combined investment exceeding US$ 3.4 billion in Egypt. Indian companies are operating in all major sectors of the Egyptian economy and several others are planning new investments, including in new areas such as Green Hydrogen. Technical cooperation and assistance has traditionally been a major part of our bilateral relationship. Since 2000, over 1600 Egyptian officials have benefited from ITEC and other programs like ICCR and IAFS scholarships. I am happy to note that we could re-convene some of mechanisms for bilateral institutional dialogue like Foreign Office Consultation, Joint Trade Committee, Joint Business Council and several JWGs.
Our defence cooperation has expanded significantly in the last two years, with 45 defence delegations from India having visited Egypt. Armed Forces from both countries have participated in joint defence exercises with growing frequency. Since 2021, our Air Forces have conducted three joint exercises, which is unprecedented. India participated for the first time ever in Egypt’s Biannual Multinational Military Exercise ‘Bright Star-23’ in September 2023 with participation by contingents from Indian Air Force, Army and Navy. In fact, it was after many decades that a contingent from Indian Army visited Egypt to participate in a joint exercise. During the last couple of years, Indian Navy ships have made 17 port calls and conducted ‘PASSEX’ with Egyptian Navy.
The Indian diaspora of about 4000 has significantly contributed to Egyptian economy and are mostly involved in trade and manufacturing. There are about 976 Indian students are studying in Al Azhar University, Ain Shams Medical University and Cairo University. The ‘Maulana Azad Centre for Indian Culture’ (MACIC) has been promoting cultural cooperation between the two countries through regular activities such as Hindi, Urdu and Yoga and Kathak classes; Seminars; film shows; exhibitions and participation in local cultural activities. MACIC has been organizing ‟Glimpses of India” painting competition for Egyptian children for the last 25 years. I am happy to share that the 27th edition of the event was held in December 2023, across seven Governorates in Egypt with participation of over 11,500 students.
In a year of unprecedented achievements, India soared to new heights from being the first country to land on Moon’s South Pole to the successful hosting of G20 Summit in Sept 2023 to showcasing its technological prowess and innovation on global stage. If we analyse some of the outstanding accomplishments during 2023, one will find that many of these are from the fields of science and technology. The technical success of India’s ‘Chandrayann-3’ lunar Lander Mission, on 23 August 2023, has helped not just our space programme but also India’s standing on the global stage.
India has witnessed the fastest 5G roll-out in the world. Within 8 months of its launch on 01st October 2022 by Prime Minister Modi, the 5G services were installed at 2,00,000 sites covering 700 districts. Today, the 5G network has been rolled out in all 28 states and 8 UTs .
India topped the global rankings in digital payments for the year 2022. During the year, there were 89.5 million digital transactions in the country. India accounted for 46 per cent of the global real-time payments in 2022, which was more than the combined digital payments the next four top countries. India is a global leader in IT and increasingly emerging as a global leader in FINTECH and ITeS. Digital technology can bring scale, speed and transparency into governance. India has developed digital public goods based on open source, open APIs, open standards, which are interoperable and public. In the year 2023, India exported US$ 193 billion worth of IT and Financial Services, which was a sharp 12.2% increase from the previous year. We are ready to work with friendly countries like Egypt to share our best practices and experiences in digitization and financial inclusion.
India’s journey to becoming a global manufacturing hub underscores the impact of strategic investments in infrastructure development to enhance the ease of doing business. Initiatives like ‘Make in India’ have successfully enticed global manufacturers to set up shop in the country. The Production-Linked Incentive (PLI), a subsidy program designed to stimulate manufacturing, has proven to be a significant driver of success. Furthermore, India’s thriving Start-up ecosystem, boasting over 99,000 recognized Start-ups and 108 Unicorns, has become a cornerstone of innovation and job creation. The ‘Start-up India’ initiative, geared towards promoting entrepreneurship and fostering a favourable ecosystem, provides a range of benefits such as tax exemptions, funding opportunities and streamlined access to capital.
The far-sighted leadership as well as the conducive policies and entrepreneurship has enabled Indian economy to become the 5th largest in the world with a GDP of US$ 3.7 trillion in 2023. Reforms spanning taxation, foreign direct investment (FDI) and ease of doing business have not only stimulated domestic economic growth but have also attracted substantial foreign investment.
The evolution of India from a British colony to a sovereign, democratic and secular nation is an inspiring success-story. Though India has moved ahead on the path of progress and prosperity, it has not forgotten or left behind its fellow travellers from ‘Global South’. Throughout its Presidency of the G20, India shared a vision for ‘Global South’ and emerged as a powerful voice for their concerns and priorities.
Today, India is filled with self-confidence and poised to emerge as the third largest economy in a few years and the leading player in many key technologies. I call upon all our Egyptian friends to come and be part of this journey for benefit of people of both our countries.
