Madhav Das Nalapat
Encyclopedia
Madhav Das Nalapat holds the UNESCO
Peace Chair and is Professor of Geopolitics
at Manipal University, an international private university headquartered in Southern India
. The former Coordinating Editor of the Times of India, Prof. Nalapat writes extensively on security
, policy and international affairs
, and is a columnist for the
Sunday Guardian and the Pakistan Observer. Nalapat has no formal role in the Indian government, although he is said to influence policy at the highest levels. Before joining the Times of India in 1989, Nalapat was Editor of the Mathrubhumi
,a "Malayalam"-language newspaper that at had a daily circulation in excess of 500,000 when he left. Previous to becoming the editor in 1984, Nalapat had been Editorial Director of the Mathrubhumi Group of publcations,and previous to that ( from 1978), Executive Director of the newspaper company. He continued on the Board of Directors throughout his tenure in the company.
Printing and Publishing Company Limited, in which capacity he implemented the Trivandrum edition project in the record time of twenty-seven months. In 1984 he switched to the editorial side, taking over as editor of the Mathrubhumi
Daily and the Mathrubhumi Illustrated Weekly. ABC figures will show the exponential growth of circulation during his period (1984–88). As editor, he gave prominence to the war against corruption
and against social evils such as discrimination against women and the socially disadvantaged.
In 1989 he shifted from Malayalam to English-language journalism, becoming the resident editor Times of India at Bangalore
. Once again, circulation and credibility surged after the edition broke free of the hidden censorship of the political class. In 1994 he moved to Delhi
as resident editor of the Times of India. It was that year that the “Old Lady of Bori Bunder” finally abandoned its lock-step fealty to British English and began speaking in the idiom of what is well on the way to becoming the country with the largest English speaking population in the world. He also worked as Chief of News Bureau in 1995-1997, before becoming contributing editor
in end-1998 to concentrate on writing. In these capacities, he developed his ideas on secular nationalism and its use in nation-building. The next year, he merged journalism
with academics, becoming India's first professor of geopolitics
at Manipal University and a distinguished fellow of the University of Georgia
. In the past, he has served on the academic councils of Trivandrum, Calicut and Bangalore
Universities.
He has contributed to leading publications throughout the world and has written six books, one of which is INDUTVA
, the central thesis of which is that every Indian is a synthesis of Vedic
, Moghul and Western cultural DNA
and religious exclusivism goes against such an ethos of fusion.
Apart from his work, he has played a key role in the literacy movement in Kerala
, as the first honorary coordinator of the Kerala Association for Non-formal Education and Development. He was also the honorary secretary of the Kerala Children’s Film Society, which screens educational films for children. He has also been active in environmental issues as honorary secretary of the Kerala Forestry Board, besides other NGOs. He has been active in actions designed to ensure that socially disadvantaged sections of Indian society were enabled to get better – if not equal – treatment, and has not diluted his secular vision of society,believing that the peoples of all faiths need to be given equal treatment in all lands.
Creating stronger educational ties between India
Prof. Nalapat has been heavily involved in an initiative to bring top level American universities, and their education system, into India. He believes that the lack of world-class research in modern Indian universities can be reversed by the infusion of US-style praxis-based learning,and that as has happened in other fields, universities in India will quickly mutate in order to compete with such an external challenge. In this context,he has himself visited campuses across the US,including the University of Georgia, the University of Texas at Dallas, Miami University, Ohio State University, American University in Washington DC and others. This focus on quality has made him say that:"We are not second-class citizens of global education, and we will not settle for the leavings of Americans' faculty clubs. [...] Indian education is sound and has been improving, but most have tended to turn out competent graduates rather than world-beaters. What we really need is to nurture excellence, which means that we want world-class centers. We need geniuses, and we cannot afford to settle for less."
India
During the days when India was frozen in the Cold War
block, there was not much attention being paid to his view that closer economic ties with the U.S. would be better than ties to the U.S.S.R. But, in 1991, one of his mentors, P. V. Narasimha Rao
, took over as prime minister and put together an informal group of friends, including Nalapat, to develop new ideas on economics and national security.
With the U.S. and Indian foreign policy establishments still suspicious of each other, an icebreaker was needed. The Indian diaspora
in the U.S. -- one of the most prosperous and educated groups in that country—was seemingly made-to-order, not only in helping convince Washington
to forget India's pro-Moscow
Cold War tilt, but also using networks of family and friends in India to chip away at the hostility of several key officials toward a warming of ties with the U.S.
Nalapat started promoting the creation of formal networks among Americans of East Indian
descent in 1992. By 1995, Indian-Americans had formed lobbying
organizations in Washington that were modelled—not accidentally—on the successful Jewish-American groups. This became a pivot for a way to encourage closer relations between Israel and India: Nalapat saw Jewish-Americans as the perfect ally for Indian-Americans in Washington. "Indians and Jews shared a sense of humour and slightly chaotic minds", he wrote. "They were born to be close." By 1999, the alliance between the two diasporas had begun to resonate on Capitol Hill.
The relationship became so strong that, in 2003, they played a large part in successfully lobbying the American government to allow Israel to sell Phalcon airborne early warning radar
systems to India. In fact, in a decade India and Israel have gone from the skimpiest official relationship to Al Quds being the second largest defence
supplier to India (after Russia
). The new Indo-Israeli-U.S. security
trio came out of the closet in 2003, with Nalapat hosting a high-level trilateral conference in New Delhi. The following year the conference was held in Herzliyya, Israel; a third was held in Washington.
India-China
In 2000, Prof. Nalapat organized the first non-official India-China conference in which serving members of the armed forces
of both countries participated. Since 1998, he has visited China
several times, meeting Communist Party of China
officials, People's Liberation Army
officers, academics and others. He has also lectured at Peking and Fudan universities. In December 2003, he was part of the India team at the India-China Round Table organized by the University of Hong Kong. His department at Manipal has hosted several meetings, conferences and lectures with Chinese experts, at which efforts have been made to understand and afterwards suggest ways to harmonize the policies of both countries.
From 1999 onwards,he has laid emphasis on (1) people-to-people contact (2) economic linkages (3) exchanges (4) educational exchanges, recognizing that progress on resolving the border dispute was likely to be slow and that progress on other fronts would help towards a resolution on this front.
-- which shares a 3,400-km border
with India -- New Delhi
had gingerly avoided closer contact with the island powerhouse whose exports are more than double India's. However, because of concern about China's growing might, several policy-makers in New Delhi are appreciative of Nalapat's efforst to develop close scientific and business links with Taiwan. Since 2003, key officials from both countries have been quietly visiting each other, and more than 5,000 Indian high-tech personnel now work in Taiwan.
To the Taiwanese, Nalapat has stressed commonalities: India and Taiwan are both democracies, something important to the Americans; India excels in software, Taiwan dominates in hardware
; India needs investment
, Taiwan is looking for manpower platforms to diversify into. Some of that investment would be in India's high-tech sector. And there is also the lure of India's $150-billion infrastructure
market: India needs roads, ports and the like—projects in which the Taiwanese have much experience. As part of his initiative for better links with Taiwan,Nalapat has hosted several Taiwanese delegations in India, including from the KMT and the DPP
.
India-Iran
Professor Nalapat also lectured an audience on Secularism at the Shahid Behesti University, Teheran, in December 2004 and introduced himself at the beginning of his talk as a friend of both the US and Israel while being an admirer of the Persian people
and their history, religion and culture. He hosted the first India-Iran Civilisational Dialogue at Manipal in 2006, which was followed up by the next round in Tehran (2007), and has visited Iran several times in order to promote the long-standing traditions and promotion of a culture of friendship and understanding.
(or association of English-speaking countries) that would have the UK, the US and India at the core.
in September 2003, is for a North America-Asia Treaty Organization (NAATO), anchored by the U.S. and India, that would serve as a security system for Asian democracies. Canada
would also be a partner, along with Japan
, Kuwait
, Oman
, Singapore
, Australia
and South Korea
.
Interestingly, the "core coalition" announced in December 2004 by George W. Bush
to fight the effects of the killer tsunami
comprised the very same countries intended to form the heart of NAATO: the U.S. and India, along with Japan and Australia. While the latter two are no surprises, the presence of India could be indicative of the future direction of alliances between North America and Asia. This is the first time that India has been at the core of a U.S. alliance. And the announcement of the tsunami coalition was closely followed by the visit of a U.S. delegation to New Delhi to discuss integrating India into the Bush administration's missile defence plan, a proposal that by 2007 had become reality.
Informally, NAATO may already be starting to come together. The Singaporean
military now trains in India. American warships refuel at Indian ports. Indian ships escort U.S. vessels through parts of the region. Both Japan and Australia have begun joint military exercises and intelligence sharing with India.
Views on Kuwait
Just as Singapore has become the anchor of India wthin ASEAN, Kuwait is another country small in size but moderate in ethos and modernized.Since 1998, Professor Nalapat has seen Kuwait as playing within the Gulf Cooperation Council a role similar to Singapore further east, and has visited the state frequently in order to help put together strategic linkages. According to him, the moderate philosophy of “Sabahism” can be an alternative to the radical chant of Wahabbism that has created such friction within the Arab world as well as between the Arab world – with its millennial tradition of knowledge – and the rest of the globe. He sees the granting of democratic rights to the Kuwaiti people by the Al Sabahs as being the way other monarchies in the region need to follow.
Views on Pakistan
Since the early 1990s he has been concerned with the way in which the Pakistan Army has evolved since the 1970s has weakened Pakistani civil society in general and the moderate elements in particular. He has held since then that the elements necessary for a stable Pakistan are the reform of the Pakistan Army into a professional force accepting of civilian control; a federal political structure that gives each region equal status; and a polity that is not discriminatory towards minorities and women. Interestingly,Nalapat is one of only two prominent Indian journalists who write a regular column in a Pakistan newspaper, in his case this being the Pakistan Observer.
Climate change
Since early 2006, Prof Nalapat has been active in seeking to integrate the study of climate change into school and college curricula across India with the goal of making the new generation of Indians understand the reality of climate change and the need for viable counter-measures. Manipal University is one of the first in the world (if not the first), to make climate change studies a compulsory component of all fields of study offered by the university, including health, management, engineering, architecture, geopolitics, etc.
of Saudi Arabia
. Unlike previous dialogues,where only the Abrahamic faiths (Christianity, Islam and Judaism) were represented,the Geneva dialogue included speakers from the Buddhist, Hindu
, Sikh
and Jain faiths, as did subsequent dialogues.
Foundation Prizeman of the University.
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
Peace Chair and is Professor of Geopolitics
Geopolitics
Geopolitics, from Greek Γη and Πολιτική in broad terms, is a theory that describes the relation between politics and territory whether on local or international scale....
at Manipal University, an international private university headquartered in Southern India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. The former Coordinating Editor of the Times of India, Prof. Nalapat writes extensively on security
Security
Security is the degree of protection against danger, damage, loss, and crime. Security as a form of protection are structures and processes that provide or improve security as a condition. The Institute for Security and Open Methodologies in the OSSTMM 3 defines security as "a form of protection...
, policy and international affairs
International relations
International relations is the study of relationships between countries, including the roles of states, inter-governmental organizations , international nongovernmental organizations , non-governmental organizations and multinational corporations...
, and is a columnist for the
Sunday Guardian and the Pakistan Observer. Nalapat has no formal role in the Indian government, although he is said to influence policy at the highest levels. Before joining the Times of India in 1989, Nalapat was Editor of the Mathrubhumi
Mathrubhumi
Mathrubhumi is a Malayalam language newspaper that is published from Kerala, India. Mathrubhumi was founded by K. P. Kesava Menon, an active volunteer in the Indian freedom struggle against the British.-History:...
,a "Malayalam"-language newspaper that at had a daily circulation in excess of 500,000 when he left. Previous to becoming the editor in 1984, Nalapat had been Editorial Director of the Mathrubhumi Group of publcations,and previous to that ( from 1978), Executive Director of the newspaper company. He continued on the Board of Directors throughout his tenure in the company.
Career
M. D. Nalapat began his academic career as fellow of the Centre for Political Research in 1974. Four years later he moved to business management, taking over as executive director of the MathrubhumiMathrubhumi
Mathrubhumi is a Malayalam language newspaper that is published from Kerala, India. Mathrubhumi was founded by K. P. Kesava Menon, an active volunteer in the Indian freedom struggle against the British.-History:...
Printing and Publishing Company Limited, in which capacity he implemented the Trivandrum edition project in the record time of twenty-seven months. In 1984 he switched to the editorial side, taking over as editor of the Mathrubhumi
Mathrubhumi
Mathrubhumi is a Malayalam language newspaper that is published from Kerala, India. Mathrubhumi was founded by K. P. Kesava Menon, an active volunteer in the Indian freedom struggle against the British.-History:...
Daily and the Mathrubhumi Illustrated Weekly. ABC figures will show the exponential growth of circulation during his period (1984–88). As editor, he gave prominence to the war against corruption
Political corruption
Political corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. Misuse of government power for other purposes, such as repression of political opponents and general police brutality, is not considered political corruption. Neither are illegal acts by...
and against social evils such as discrimination against women and the socially disadvantaged.
In 1989 he shifted from Malayalam to English-language journalism, becoming the resident editor Times of India at Bangalore
Bangalore
Bengaluru , formerly called Bengaluru is the capital of the Indian state of Karnataka. Bangalore is nicknamed the Garden City and was once called a pensioner's paradise. Located on the Deccan Plateau in the south-eastern part of Karnataka, Bangalore is India's third most populous city and...
. Once again, circulation and credibility surged after the edition broke free of the hidden censorship of the political class. In 1994 he moved to Delhi
Delhi
Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census...
as resident editor of the Times of India. It was that year that the “Old Lady of Bori Bunder” finally abandoned its lock-step fealty to British English and began speaking in the idiom of what is well on the way to becoming the country with the largest English speaking population in the world. He also worked as Chief of News Bureau in 1995-1997, before becoming contributing editor
Contributing editor
A contributing editor is a magazine job title that varies in responsibilities. Most often, a contributing editor is a freelancer who has proven ability and readership draw. The contributing editor regularly contributes articles to the publication but does not actually edit articles, and the title...
in end-1998 to concentrate on writing. In these capacities, he developed his ideas on secular nationalism and its use in nation-building. The next year, he merged journalism
Journalism
Journalism is the practice of investigation and reporting of events, issues and trends to a broad audience in a timely fashion. Though there are many variations of journalism, the ideal is to inform the intended audience. Along with covering organizations and institutions such as government and...
with academics, becoming India's first professor of geopolitics
Geopolitics
Geopolitics, from Greek Γη and Πολιτική in broad terms, is a theory that describes the relation between politics and territory whether on local or international scale....
at Manipal University and a distinguished fellow of the University of Georgia
University of Georgia
The University of Georgia is a public research university located in Athens, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1785, it is the oldest and largest of the state's institutions of higher learning and is one of multiple schools to claim the title of the oldest public university in the United States...
. In the past, he has served on the academic councils of Trivandrum, Calicut and Bangalore
Bangalore
Bengaluru , formerly called Bengaluru is the capital of the Indian state of Karnataka. Bangalore is nicknamed the Garden City and was once called a pensioner's paradise. Located on the Deccan Plateau in the south-eastern part of Karnataka, Bangalore is India's third most populous city and...
Universities.
He has contributed to leading publications throughout the world and has written six books, one of which is INDUTVA
INDUTVA
INDUTVA, a book by M D Nalapat, holds as its central thesis that every Indian is a synthesis of Vedic, Moghul and Western cultural DNA and religious exclusivism goes against such an ethos of fusion. Madhav Das Nalapat , holds the UNESCO Peace Chair and is Director of the Department of Geopolitics...
, the central thesis of which is that every Indian is a synthesis of Vedic
Historical Vedic religion
The religion of the Vedic period is a historical predecessor of Hinduism. Its liturgy is reflected in the mantra portion of the four Vedas, which are compiled in Sanskrit. The religious practices centered on a clergy administering rites...
, Moghul and Western cultural DNA
DNA
Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...
and religious exclusivism goes against such an ethos of fusion.
Apart from his work, he has played a key role in the literacy movement in Kerala
Kerala
or Keralam is an Indian state located on the Malabar coast of south-west India. It was created on 1 November 1956 by the States Reorganisation Act by combining various Malayalam speaking regions....
, as the first honorary coordinator of the Kerala Association for Non-formal Education and Development. He was also the honorary secretary of the Kerala Children’s Film Society, which screens educational films for children. He has also been active in environmental issues as honorary secretary of the Kerala Forestry Board, besides other NGOs. He has been active in actions designed to ensure that socially disadvantaged sections of Indian society were enabled to get better – if not equal – treatment, and has not diluted his secular vision of society,believing that the peoples of all faiths need to be given equal treatment in all lands.
Creating stronger educational ties between IndiaIndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
and the world, in particular the United StatesUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
Prof. Nalapat has been heavily involved in an initiative to bring top level American universities, and their education system, into India. He believes that the lack of world-class research in modern Indian universities can be reversed by the infusion of US-style praxis-based learning,and that as has happened in other fields, universities in India will quickly mutate in order to compete with such an external challenge. In this context,he has himself visited campuses across the US,including the University of Georgia, the University of Texas at Dallas, Miami University, Ohio State University, American University in Washington DC and others. This focus on quality has made him say that:"We are not second-class citizens of global education, and we will not settle for the leavings of Americans' faculty clubs. [...] Indian education is sound and has been improving, but most have tended to turn out competent graduates rather than world-beaters. What we really need is to nurture excellence, which means that we want world-class centers. We need geniuses, and we cannot afford to settle for less."IndiaIndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
-IsraelIsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
-U.S.United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
relations
During the days when India was frozen in the Cold WarCold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
block, there was not much attention being paid to his view that closer economic ties with the U.S. would be better than ties to the U.S.S.R. But, in 1991, one of his mentors, P. V. Narasimha Rao
P. V. Narasimha Rao
Pamulaparti Venkata "Narasimha Rao" was the ninth Prime Minister of India . He led an important administration, overseeing a major economic transformation and several home incidents affecting national security of India. Rao accelerated the dismantling of the Licence Raj. He is often referred to as...
, took over as prime minister and put together an informal group of friends, including Nalapat, to develop new ideas on economics and national security.
With the U.S. and Indian foreign policy establishments still suspicious of each other, an icebreaker was needed. The Indian diaspora
Diaspora
A diaspora is "the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland" or "people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location", or "people settled far from their ancestral homelands".The word has come to refer to historical mass-dispersions of...
in the U.S. -- one of the most prosperous and educated groups in that country—was seemingly made-to-order, not only in helping convince Washington
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
to forget India's pro-Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
Cold War tilt, but also using networks of family and friends in India to chip away at the hostility of several key officials toward a warming of ties with the U.S.
Nalapat started promoting the creation of formal networks among Americans of East Indian
Indian people
Indian people or Indisians constitute the Asian nation and pan-ethnic group native to India, which forms the south of Asia, containing 17.31% of the world's population. The Indian nationality is in essence made up of regional nationalities, reflecting the rich and complex history of India...
descent in 1992. By 1995, Indian-Americans had formed lobbying
Lobbying
Lobbying is the act of attempting to influence decisions made by officials in the government, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying is done by various people or groups, from private-sector individuals or corporations, fellow legislators or government officials, or...
organizations in Washington that were modelled—not accidentally—on the successful Jewish-American groups. This became a pivot for a way to encourage closer relations between Israel and India: Nalapat saw Jewish-Americans as the perfect ally for Indian-Americans in Washington. "Indians and Jews shared a sense of humour and slightly chaotic minds", he wrote. "They were born to be close." By 1999, the alliance between the two diasporas had begun to resonate on Capitol Hill.
The relationship became so strong that, in 2003, they played a large part in successfully lobbying the American government to allow Israel to sell Phalcon airborne early warning radar
Early warning radar
An early warning radar is any radar system used primarily for the long-range detection of its targets, i.e., allowing defences to be alerted as early as possible before the intruder reaches its target, giving the defences the maximum time in which to operate...
systems to India. In fact, in a decade India and Israel have gone from the skimpiest official relationship to Al Quds being the second largest defence
Military
A military is an organization authorized by its greater society to use lethal force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or perceived threats. The military may have additional functions of use to its greater society, such as advancing a political agenda e.g...
supplier to India (after Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
). The new Indo-Israeli-U.S. security
Security
Security is the degree of protection against danger, damage, loss, and crime. Security as a form of protection are structures and processes that provide or improve security as a condition. The Institute for Security and Open Methodologies in the OSSTMM 3 defines security as "a form of protection...
trio came out of the closet in 2003, with Nalapat hosting a high-level trilateral conference in New Delhi. The following year the conference was held in Herzliyya, Israel; a third was held in Washington.
India-ChinaChinaChinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
relations
In 2000, Prof. Nalapat organized the first non-official India-China conference in which serving members of the armed forcesArmed forces
The armed forces of a country are its government-sponsored defense, fighting forces, and organizations. They exist to further the foreign and domestic policies of their governing body, and to defend that body and the nation it represents from external aggressors. In some countries paramilitary...
of both countries participated. Since 1998, he has visited China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
several times, meeting Communist Party of China
Communist Party of China
The Communist Party of China , also known as the Chinese Communist Party , is the founding and ruling political party of the People's Republic of China...
officials, People's Liberation Army
People's Liberation Army
The People's Liberation Army is the unified military organization of all land, sea, strategic missile and air forces of the People's Republic of China. The PLA was established on August 1, 1927 — celebrated annually as "PLA Day" — as the military arm of the Communist Party of China...
officers, academics and others. He has also lectured at Peking and Fudan universities. In December 2003, he was part of the India team at the India-China Round Table organized by the University of Hong Kong. His department at Manipal has hosted several meetings, conferences and lectures with Chinese experts, at which efforts have been made to understand and afterwards suggest ways to harmonize the policies of both countries.
From 1999 onwards,he has laid emphasis on (1) people-to-people contact (2) economic linkages (3) exchanges (4) educational exchanges, recognizing that progress on resolving the border dispute was likely to be slow and that progress on other fronts would help towards a resolution on this front.
India-Taiwan relations
Nalapat has also worked on improving Indo-Taiwan relations. He considers Taiwan an economic power that is important to the balance of technological and knowledge mindshare in Asia. Because of a hesitation to provoke ChinaChina
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
-- which shares a 3,400-km border
Border
Borders define geographic boundaries of political entities or legal jurisdictions, such as governments, sovereign states, federated states and other subnational entities. Some borders—such as a state's internal administrative borders, or inter-state borders within the Schengen Area—are open and...
with India -- New Delhi
New Delhi
New Delhi is the capital city of India. It serves as the centre of the Government of India and the Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi. New Delhi is situated within the metropolis of Delhi. It is one of the nine districts of Delhi Union Territory. The total area of the city is...
had gingerly avoided closer contact with the island powerhouse whose exports are more than double India's. However, because of concern about China's growing might, several policy-makers in New Delhi are appreciative of Nalapat's efforst to develop close scientific and business links with Taiwan. Since 2003, key officials from both countries have been quietly visiting each other, and more than 5,000 Indian high-tech personnel now work in Taiwan.
To the Taiwanese, Nalapat has stressed commonalities: India and Taiwan are both democracies, something important to the Americans; India excels in software, Taiwan dominates in hardware
Hardware
Hardware is a general term for equipment such as keys, locks, hinges, latches, handles, wire, chains, plumbing supplies, tools, utensils, cutlery and machine parts. Household hardware is typically sold in hardware stores....
; India needs investment
Investment
Investment has different meanings in finance and economics. Finance investment is putting money into something with the expectation of gain, that upon thorough analysis, has a high degree of security for the principal amount, as well as security of return, within an expected period of time...
, Taiwan is looking for manpower platforms to diversify into. Some of that investment would be in India's high-tech sector. And there is also the lure of India's $150-billion infrastructure
Infrastructure
Infrastructure is basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function...
market: India needs roads, ports and the like—projects in which the Taiwanese have much experience. As part of his initiative for better links with Taiwan,Nalapat has hosted several Taiwanese delegations in India, including from the KMT and the DPP
DPP
- Business :* Direct Participation Program, plan investments in business ventures* DSM , a Dutch chemical and pharmaceutical company* Discounted payback period- Photography :* Digital Photo Professional, software provided with the Canon EOS camera...
.
India-IranIranIran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
relations
Professor Nalapat also lectured an audience on Secularism at the Shahid Behesti University, Teheran, in December 2004 and introduced himself at the beginning of his talk as a friend of both the US and Israel while being an admirer of the Persian peoplePersian people
The Persian people are part of the Iranian peoples who speak the modern Persian language and closely akin Iranian dialects and languages. The origin of the ethnic Iranian/Persian peoples are traced to the Ancient Iranian peoples, who were part of the ancient Indo-Iranians and themselves part of...
and their history, religion and culture. He hosted the first India-Iran Civilisational Dialogue at Manipal in 2006, which was followed up by the next round in Tehran (2007), and has visited Iran several times in order to promote the long-standing traditions and promotion of a culture of friendship and understanding.
Concept of the 'Greater West'
In 2008 he published his concept of the Greater West, a concept based not "on the skin but in the mind", by which he meant that such a union had at its core not ethnicity but shared civilisational values. His concept of the Greater West includes Turkey, Israel, India and Singapore. He has also written about a 21st Century AnglosphereAnglosphere
Anglosphere is a neologism which refers to those nations with English as the most common language. The term can be used more specifically to refer to those nations which share certain characteristics within their cultures based on a linguistic heritage, through being former British colonies...
(or association of English-speaking countries) that would have the UK, the US and India at the core.
NAATO
Another Nalapat proposal, pitched to officials in Washington, D.C.Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
in September 2003, is for a North America-Asia Treaty Organization (NAATO), anchored by the U.S. and India, that would serve as a security system for Asian democracies. Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
would also be a partner, along with Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, Kuwait
Kuwait
The State of Kuwait is a sovereign Arab state situated in the north-east of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south at Khafji, and Iraq to the north at Basra. It lies on the north-western shore of the Persian Gulf. The name Kuwait is derived from the...
, Oman
Oman
Oman , officially called the Sultanate of Oman , is an Arab state in southwest Asia on the southeast coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by the United Arab Emirates to the northwest, Saudi Arabia to the west, and Yemen to the southwest. The coast is formed by the Arabian Sea on the...
, Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
and South Korea
South Korea
The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...
.
Interestingly, the "core coalition" announced in December 2004 by George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
to fight the effects of the killer tsunami
Tsunami
A tsunami is a series of water waves caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, typically an ocean or a large lake...
comprised the very same countries intended to form the heart of NAATO: the U.S. and India, along with Japan and Australia. While the latter two are no surprises, the presence of India could be indicative of the future direction of alliances between North America and Asia. This is the first time that India has been at the core of a U.S. alliance. And the announcement of the tsunami coalition was closely followed by the visit of a U.S. delegation to New Delhi to discuss integrating India into the Bush administration's missile defence plan, a proposal that by 2007 had become reality.
Informally, NAATO may already be starting to come together. The Singaporean
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
military now trains in India. American warships refuel at Indian ports. Indian ships escort U.S. vessels through parts of the region. Both Japan and Australia have begun joint military exercises and intelligence sharing with India.
Views on Wahabbism/Khomeinism
From 1992 onwards he has warned against religious supremacy, which in his view ought to be treated as strongly as racial supremacy was in the past. In this context, he has written that Wahabbism and its ideological twin, Khomeinism are one of the twin dangers to the civilized world in the modern era. Another danger is political authoritarianism, especially when combined with control of an unelected elite over any powerful state.Views on KuwaitKuwaitThe State of Kuwait is a sovereign Arab state situated in the north-east of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south at Khafji, and Iraq to the north at Basra. It lies on the north-western shore of the Persian Gulf. The name Kuwait is derived from the...
Just as Singapore has become the anchor of India wthin ASEAN, Kuwait is another country small in size but moderate in ethos and modernized.Since 1998, Professor Nalapat has seen Kuwait as playing within the Gulf Cooperation Council a role similar to Singapore further east, and has visited the state frequently in order to help put together strategic linkages. According to him, the moderate philosophy of “Sabahism” can be an alternative to the radical chant of Wahabbism that has created such friction within the Arab world as well as between the Arab world – with its millennial tradition of knowledge – and the rest of the globe. He sees the granting of democratic rights to the Kuwaiti people by the Al Sabahs as being the way other monarchies in the region need to follow.Views on PakistanPakistanPakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
Since the early 1990s he has been concerned with the way in which the Pakistan Army has evolved since the 1970s has weakened Pakistani civil society in general and the moderate elements in particular. He has held since then that the elements necessary for a stable Pakistan are the reform of the Pakistan Army into a professional force accepting of civilian control; a federal political structure that gives each region equal status; and a polity that is not discriminatory towards minorities and women. Interestingly,Nalapat is one of only two prominent Indian journalists who write a regular column in a Pakistan newspaper, in his case this being the Pakistan Observer.Climate changeClimate changeClimate change is a significant and lasting change in the statistical distribution of weather patterns over periods ranging from decades to millions of years. It may be a change in average weather conditions or the distribution of events around that average...
and education
Since early 2006, Prof Nalapat has been active in seeking to integrate the study of climate change into school and college curricula across India with the goal of making the new generation of Indians understand the reality of climate change and the need for viable counter-measures. Manipal University is one of the first in the world (if not the first), to make climate change studies a compulsory component of all fields of study offered by the university, including health, management, engineering, architecture, geopolitics, etc.Technological Linkages
Since October 2006, Prof Nalapat has been working on science and technology partnerships between India and Scandinavian countries especially in the fields of: renewable energy; disaster relief and management; and, potentially, nuclear safety mechanisms and processes. Several rounds of discussions are taking place to operationalize these projects. Since 2008, he has expanded this search for technology partners to include Russia, which in India has a much more natural partner than the other giant of Asia, China.International Interfaith Dialogue
Professor Nalapat has been active in promoting an international interfaith dialogue. In this context, he was invited to be a speaker at the International Interfaith Dialogue held in Geneva in 2009 under the patronage of King AbdullahKing Abdullah
-Current monarchs:*Abdullah of Saudi Arabia , regent of Saudi Arabia since 1999 and king since 2005*Abdullah II of Jordan , king of Jordan since 1999-Previous monarchs:*Abdullah I of Jordan , king of Transjordan...
of Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia , commonly known in British English as Saudi Arabia and in Arabic as as-Sa‘ūdiyyah , is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab World...
. Unlike previous dialogues,where only the Abrahamic faiths (Christianity, Islam and Judaism) were represented,the Geneva dialogue included speakers from the Buddhist, Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
, Sikh
Sikh
A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...
and Jain faiths, as did subsequent dialogues.
Other achievements
- Madhav Das Nalapat is a Gold Medalist in economicsEconomicsEconomics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...
from the University of Bombay. He was a Daxina Fellow and a Lotus
Foundation Prizeman of the University.
Current affiliations
- Director of Department of Geopolitics, UNESCO Peace Chair, Manipal University
- Distinguished Fellow, CITS, The University of GeorgiaUniversity of GeorgiaThe University of Georgia is a public research university located in Athens, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1785, it is the oldest and largest of the state's institutions of higher learning and is one of multiple schools to claim the title of the oldest public university in the United States...
- Member of the Advisory Council, Naveen Hindustan Foundation, New Delhi
- Advisor, AsianetAsianetAsianet Communications Limited is an Indian media conglomerate jointly owned by STAR TV and Jupiter Entertainment. Formed in 1991 and headquartered in the city of Thiruvananthapuram in the south Indian state of Kerala, the company owns several television channels including Asianet, the first...
Communications Ltd, Trivandrum - Governing Body member, the Abdus Salam Foundation, London
- Life Member, Institute of Social & Economic Change, BangaloreBangaloreBengaluru , formerly called Bengaluru is the capital of the Indian state of Karnataka. Bangalore is nicknamed the Garden City and was once called a pensioner's paradise. Located on the Deccan Plateau in the south-eastern part of Karnataka, Bangalore is India's third most populous city and...
- Senior Associate, National Institute of Advanced StudiesNational Institute of Advanced StudiesThe National Institute of Advanced Studies , is a research institute in India.It is one of the unique institutions in the country conducting research in multidisciplinary areas....
, Bangalore - Advisory Board Member, Institute of Management, Meerut
- Associate member, United Services Institution, New Delhi