Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Saudi Arabia on April 22 shored up ties in traditional areas like energy while expanding cooperation into newer areas like space, defense, and technology between the two countries.
The visit was Modi’s third in the past decade to the oil-rich kingdom, an influential voice in the Islamic world and the most prominent member of the Gulf Cooperation Council. Though the visit was cut short by a deadly terrorist strike in India’s Kashmir region that claimed 26 lives, it helped deepen the partnership that has been on a remarkable growth trajectory since 2016. Improving relations with Saudi Arabia, whose monarch is the custodian of two of Islam’s holiest sites, is an integral part of India’s “Look West Strategy,” which seeks to bind India closer to the countries of this region.
According to a joint statement, India and Saudi Arabia reinforced their traditional energy partnership by sealing an agreement on setting up two oil refineries in India.
Energy-starved India is the world’s third-largest importer and consumer of oil, relying on imports for more than 85 percent of its crude oil requirements. Recent news reports had suggested that the share of Saudi Arabian oil exports to India had fallen after India began importing discounted crude oil from Russia. The pact on the oil refineries underlines Saudi Arabia’s key role in India’s energy calculus.
Besides this, India has agreed to work with Saudi Arabia “to enhance the stability of global oil markets and to balance global energy market dynamics,” the joint statement said.
Beyond joint projects in refining and the petrochemical sector, there are other elements of cooperation in the energy sector, including innovative uses of hydrocarbons; a joint study for electrical interconnection between the two countries; exchanging expertise on the issues of grid automation, connectivity, and security; energy storage and green hydrogen transport.
The two countries also added two new ministerial committees – one on defense and another on tourism – under the Strategic Partnership Council (SPC), which is co-chaired by Modi and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (MBS). The SPC was set up in 2019 with two ministerial committees, one focusing on political and security issues and the second looking at the economy and investment. It serves to steer the bilateral relationship to include newer areas of cooperation like green energy, health, technology, and agriculture.
India welcomed the prospect of Saudi investment in infrastructure, technology, fintech, digital infrastructure, telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, and health. The two countries are aiming to conclude a bilateral investment treaty as early as possible, the joint statement said. On the trade front, India has risen to the second most prominent trade partner of Saudi Arabia; the kingdom was India’s fifth largest trading partner in 2023-2024. Both countries agreed to start talks to wrap up an India-GCC free trade pact.
The other notable takeaways were in defense and space cooperation. These are new areas reinforcing their strategic partnership. Both countries recently concluded their first land forces exercises and two rounds of naval exercises. They pledged deeper cooperation in cybersecurity, maritime border security, combating transnational crime, narcotics, and drug trafficking. The two countries also concluded a preliminary pact on cooperation in space activities for peaceful purposes.
Pledges to work together in new and emerging technology domains like artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and semiconductors were also listed in the joint statement, expanding the scope of bilateral cooperation between the two countries.
The joint statement was also notable for its unequivocal condemnation of the April 22 terrorist attack in Kashmir, which forced Modi to cut short his visit. India and Saudi Arabia “condemned cross-border terrorism, and called on all States to reject the use of terrorism against other countries, dismantle terrorism infrastructure where it exists, and bring perpetrators of terrorism to justice swiftly. Both sides stressed the need to prevent access to weapons including missiles and drones to commit terrorist acts against other countries.”
Although the statement did not name Pakistan, India believes Islamabad to be responsible for the attack, and getting Saudi condemnation for “cross border terrorism” is seen as support for India’s position on terrorism.
Several factors have contributed to India’s growing relationship with the Gulf states over the past decade. First, since becoming prime minister in 2014, Modi has assiduously courted these countries, visiting the region multiple times. He has sought to persuade GCC countries to take cognizance of New Delhi’s views on terrorism and to drop their support for Pakistan’s views on Kashmir.
Then there is the role of Indian expatriates. Almost 9 million expatriate Indians live in West Asia. They send home valuable foreign remittances.
Besides, India is looking at attracting the sovereign wealth funds of Gulf states like Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) to invest in its National Investment and Infrastructure Fund (NIIF). Created in 2017, the NIIF aims to promote investment through infrastructure development in commercially viable projects.
Modi’s recent visit to Saudi Arabia was influenced by all these factors.
That the Indian economy has been growing steadily and is expected to overtake Germany and Japan to become the world’s third-largest economy has contributed to the GCC states, including Saudi Arabia, viewing India favorably.
In February 2019, amid soaring tensions between India and Pakistan due to a terrorist attack in Pulwama in Kashmir, the Saudi crown prince visited Pakistan and returned home for a day before landing in New Delhi for his first-ever India visit. The gesture was seen as an attempt to de-hyphenate Saudi Arabia’s ties with India and Pakistan. The 2019 visit to India was important for MBS; it came at a time when the West was isolating him for his role in the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018. Brushing aside protocol, Modi went to the airport to welcome MBS on his arrival in New Delhi.
The fact that there was strong condemnation of terrorism, albeit with no mention of Kashmir, in the February 2019 joint statement in the context of serious India-Pakistan tensions, was seen in New Delhi as a sign of Saudi Arabia backing India’s position on the matter. MBS also pledged an investment of up to $100 billion in India, which was taken as a vote of confidence in the Indian economy as opposed to the $20 billion he had proposed to invest in Pakistan just days earlier.
In 2023, after visiting India for the G-20 Summit, MBS did not visit Pakistan on his way back home. But Saudi Arabia did stay away from some preparatory G-20 meetings that India hosted in Kashmir.
Cut to the present, and there are new realities that make sense for India and Saudi Arabia to reinforce their partnership.
New Delhi would like Saudi Arabia to use its political and financial clout to get Pakistan to halt anti-India terrorism. While Saudi Arabia has been sending back Indian fugitives wanted for criminal and terrorist activities in India, whether Riyadh will pressure Pakistan hard enough to give up terrorism is doubtful. Pakistan’s closeness to Turkiye and China may embolden it to brush aside Saudi pressure.
Then there is the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor that was unveiled in September 2023 on the sidelines of the India-hosted G-20 summit. Saudi Arabia is a key member of this ambitious and cost-effective ship-to-rail transit network. India and Saudi Arabia have a stake in getting this project off the ground, given its potential to transform their economies.
Modi has repeatedly signaled India’s support to Saudi Arabia’s emergence as a key “middle power.” Ahead of his meeting with MBS, he told Arab News that India supports Saudi Arabia’s interest in building a new identity for itself as a country with a forward-looking approach and ready to wean its economy off fossil fuel revenue.
In its new avatar, Riyadh is looking to broaden its economy through investments in technology, innovation, green energy, pharmaceuticals, artificial intelligence, semiconductors, and data centers. These offer India and Saudi Arabia unlimited possibilities to forge a win-win partnership.