With geostrategic conditions reconstructed and re-segregated, smaller groups will face existential trials. Just take the BRICS trading platform which is currently running. India-China relations are going through a bad phase, it is difficult to say how much this club can achieve. The meeting is taking place in the backdrop of the war in Ukraine, and China’s stance on it seems to be guided more by its rivalry with the US than by its closeness with Russia. India has been far better balanced by maintaining an independent relationship with Russia on the one hand and the value of ties with the US on the other.
New Delhi’s stand will anger Beijing as it tries to bring other countries to its anti-US position. With the risks of an economic slowdown now being faced by all, a post-Covid recovery may require some policy coordination. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his BRICS address on Thursday, spoke of a similar temperament among its five members to emphasize how the global economy is regulated to play a role. Still, the common ground may prove elusive. The founding logic of the dynamics of the five as economies has weakened. And India should beware of Chinese dominance.