ACADEMIC YEAR- 2024-2025

TOPIC- INDIA’S RELATIONS WITH JAPAN

NAME- YUVRAJ MITTAL

ENROLLMENT NO.- A26711121012

SUBJECT- POLITICAL SCIENCE (INDIAN FOREIGN POLICY IN A GLOBALIZING

WORLD)
INTRODUCTION

Post India’s independence, India’s relations with Japan have always been on the friendlier
side contrary to what it was pre-independence. It well known that Japan tried to attack India
during the second world war as India was under the influence of the British. Since then, both
the countries have enjoyed peaceful relations and have never witnessed any significant
conflict or turbulence their respective foreign policies with each other.

Japan is formed out of five main islands and is the 11 th most populous country in the world. It
is also one of the most densely populated and urbanized countries. Japan invaded China in
1937, 1941 and entered the second world war as an axis power. After defeat in the second
world war, it adopted a post war constitution and has since maintained a unitary
parliamentary constitutional monarchy.

SIMILARITIES IN BOTH THE NATIONS

As we all know that the U.S dropped two nuclear bombs on Japan during the second world
war and completely destructed to of its major cities- Hiroshima and Nagasaki. During the
same time India also got its independence and was in a dire state. Since then, Japan has
become one of the most developed countries, with most advance and respectable technology
in terms of defence, automobile, electronics, etc. on the other hand, India has not been able to
do as well as Japan in terms of economic and social development.
In this graph we can clearly see that how Japan’s per capita income sky rocketed post 1950
on the other hand the change in India’s per capita income was pretty stagnant. This graph
clearly displays the potential Japan has and the benefit that India can have with having strong
diplomatic ties with Japan. Although Japan has renounced its right to declare war, the country
maintains self-defence forces that rank as one of the world’s strongest militaries. After world
war 2, Japan has experienced record growth what is known as an economic miracle,
becoming the 2nd largest economy in the world by 1972. As of 2024, Japan is the third largest
economy by nominal GDP.

India and Japan are the two largest and oldest democracies of Asia, with common cultural
linkages due to Buddhism. Treaty of peace between Japan and India was signed on 9 th June,
1952 which restored the relations between two countries. Engagement between both the
countries enhances post 1991 and India opened up its economy.

JAPAN’S OFFICIAL DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANCE (ODA) TO INDIA

During the cold war, India supplied iron ore to Japan and in return, Japan provided ODA to
India. The ODA includes:

 Bullet trains
 Delhi metro
 North-eastern highway projects
  Skill development
 Delhi-Mumbai industrial corridor
 Ganga river cleaning project
 Bangalore-Chennai expressway

RELATIONS IN VARIOUS FIELDS

1. The nuclear issue

 Relations between the two nations reached a brief low in 1998 as a result of Pokhran
II.
 Japan imposed sanctions including cutting off economic ties and stopping all the
economic assistance. However, after 3 years the sanctions were removed.
 In 2016, India became the only non-signatory of the NPT. To receive an exemption
from Japan, “ agreement for co-operation in peaceful uses of nuclear energy” was
signed under which Japan agreed to supply nuclear reactors, fuel and technology to
India. It took 6 years to reach on this deal.

2. Economy
 Japan is the third largest investor in the Indian economy.
 Currency swap agreement amounting to 75 billion dollars have been signed between
two nations.
 The single largest railway project is being financed bu Japan is DMIC. Under this
Japan has provided low interest loan of 4.5 billion dollars.
 Any businessman or worker from Japan gets 3 years visa automatically on first arrival
in India.
 India and Japan signed an agreement in December 2015 to build a bullet train line
between Mumbai and Ahmedabad using Japan;s shinkansen technology, this will
cover 4/5th of project cost at 0.1% interest rate from Japan.

3. Military
 Exercise Malabar, which was originally started between US and India also made
Japan its official permanent partner in 2015.
 India has purchased amphibious vehicles from Japan in the past years.
  An acquisition and cross-servicing agreement and 2+2 dialogue was held between the
two nations to enhance the strategic depth of bilateral security and economic co-
operation underway.
 The Japan-America-India (JAI) trilateral summit was geld on the side-lines of G-20,
reiterating a free and open pacific.

4. Asia-Africa growth corridor

 Also known as AAGC, it is an economic co-operation agreement India-Japan and
African nations.
 It aims to develop quality infrastructure in Africa like digital connectivity.
 Free sea lanes of communication between Asia and Africa are lo be laid, reviving
ancient trade routes.
 AAGC will also work in fields of agriculture, disaster management, health and skill
development.

LATEST VISITS, THE CHINA ISSUE AND QUAD

On 19-20 March 2022, PM Kishida paid an official visit to India to hold the 14th India-Japan
Annual Summit. Both sides agreed on a joint statement titled, "Partnership for a Peaceful,
Stable and Prosperous Post COVID World". At the summit, both leaders noted with
appreciation that since elevation of ties to a Special Strategic and Global Partnership, there
had been significant growth in economic cooperation and expressed their shared intention to
realize JPY 5 trillion (approx USD 42 billion) of public and private investment and financing
from Japan to India in the next five years, to finance appropriate public and private projects
of mutual interest. They also recalled the establishment of the Japan-India Industrial
Competitiveness Partnership (IJICP) in November 2021 and welcomed the formulation of a
Roadmap under the IJICP. Both sides welcomed the launch of the Japan-India Clean Energy
Partnership (CEP), signed the exchange of notes concerning seven yen loan projects in which
Japan will provide over 300 billion yen ($2.7 billion) in total. PM Kishida and PM Modi also
met on the sidelines of the 2nd Quad Leader’s 3 Summit held in Tokyo on 24 May 2022. PM
Modi visited Japan on 27 September 2022 to participate in State Funeral of former Japanese
PM Abe Shinzo Abe, and he also held a meeting with PM Kishida during the visit.

Japan has joined India, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam and Taiwan to lodge protests
against China over its new "standard map" for including the disputed Senkaku Islands in the
East China Sea as part of its territory. Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno told
the media in Tokyo on Tuesday that Japan has lodged a strong protest to China through
diplomatic channels over a new map released by Beijing last month.

Quad brings together four countries - India, Australia, Japan, and the United States, with a
commitment to work as a force for global good and to support an open, free, and inclusive
Indo-Pacific that is prosperous and resilient.
CONCLUSION

Although many countries have helped India in terms of monetary and loan but none of them
even come close to Japan when it comes to aiding the development of India. Be it nuclear
assistance, expressways, stance on China, bullet train projects, lend money on an interest of
0.01% which is basically free money, Japan has always provided India assistance. Recently
the diplomatic ties between both the nations have become even stronger pertaining to the
common Chinese threat.
REFERENCES

Japan-Australia-India-U.S.(Quad) meetings | Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan

(mofa.go.jp)

mea.gov.in/Portal/ForeignRelation/Quad_001.pdf