Bilateral, Regional & Global Groupings

GS Paper: GS Paper II | Subject: International Relations | Last updated: 2026-07-22

---

Prelims

(Key facts, data, schemes, laws, organizations — MCQ-ready points)

UK Foreign Secretary's India Visit & UK–India FTA (Indian Express, 04-06-2026)

• UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper on her first official India visit; to meet PM Modi and EAM S. Jaishankar
• Context: India & UK concluded a Free Trade Agreement (CETA — Comprehensive Economic & Trade Agreement); both sides pushing to bring it into force soon (UK Business & Trade Secretary Peter Kyle visited earlier in the week)
• Formal review of delivery under the UK–India "Vision 2030" roadmap — covering trade, technology, defence & security, climate, education
• Pillar named: Technology Security Initiative (TSI)

India–UK CETA to Take Effect 15 July 2026 (The Hindu, 21-06-2026)

• The India–UK Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), signed July 2025, will be implemented from 15 July 2026; covers tariffs, mobility and services
• No investment chapter — unlike India's deals with New Zealand and the EFTA bloc; UK trade expert Anton Muscatelli (President, Royal Society of Edinburgh) argues this is not a concern because higher trade + ease-of-doing-business will "create an enabling framework" for FDI anyway. (Contrast: the European Commission's von der Leyen and EU envoy Hervé Delphin say the EU–India deal also lacks an investment chapter and a separate investment treaty should be worked on quickly.)*
• Mutual gains cited: UK gets entry into India's financial-services sector; India gets entry into the UK's IT-services market. FDI into India is now mostly on the automatic route; remaining investor concerns = tax compliance, land acquisition, dispute resolution, last-mile connectivity

Venezuela VP's 5-Day India Visit (Indian Express, 04-06-2026)

• Venezuelan Vice-President Delcy Rodríguez on a 5-day visit; to hold talks with PM Modi
• Focus areas: energy, trade & investment, pharmaceuticals, technology

India–South Korea Shipbuilding Partnership (The Hindu, 26-06-2026)

• South Korean President Lee Jae Myung's India visit (April 2026) — the first by a Korean leader in 8 years — gave momentum to a shipbuilding partnership in a sector India is trying to revive. South Korea's "big three" are entering India:
• Hyundai (HD Korea Shipbuilding) subsidiary signed with Cochin Shipyard Ltd and plans a $4 bn green shipyard at Thoothukudi (TN)
• Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) partnered Swan Defence & Heavy Industries to build ships in India
• Hanwha Ocean has announced India interest; the Korea Marine Equipment Association (KOMEA) (304 firms) opened a Mumbai office to seed an ancillary ecosystem
• India's maritime targets: Maritime India Vision 2030 (top-10 shipbuilding nation by 2030) and Maritime Amrit Kaal Vision 2047 (top-5 by 2047); supporting instruments = Maritime Development Fund, Shipbuilding Development Scheme, Shipbuilding Financial Assistance Policy, and the new Sagarmala Finance Corporation Ltd (SFCL) — India's first NBFC for the maritime sector. Model inspiration: South Korea's Ulsan cluster (it went from minor player to global leader in ~15 years from the 1970s)

UK PM Keir Starmer Resigns (The Hindu, 26-06-2026)

• UK PM Sir Keir Starmer announced his resignation on 22 June 2026 — a leadership change in a key partner just as the India–UK CETA is due to take effect 15 July 2026 (signed July 2025). A reminder that FTA operationalisation can be buffeted by partner-country politics (cf. the deal was "signed but not yet operationalised" through 2025–26)

India–UK CETA & Social Security Pact ENTER INTO FORCE (PIB / The Hindu, 15-07-2026)

• CETA is now operational from 15 July 2026 (concluded 6 May 2025 after 14 rounds; signed 24 July 2025 in London by Piyush Goyal and UK Business & Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds). 30 chapters, going well beyond tariffs into services, innovation, digital trade, public procurement, IPR, labour, environment and gender
• Goods: India secured immediate duty-free access on 99% of tariff lines; the UK got immediate duty elimination on 96.8% of India's tariff lines (97.7% of UK trade value). UK duties removed: processed foods up to 70%, marine 21.5%, engineering goods & auto components 18%, leather & footwear 16%, textiles & clothing 12%, chemicals & pharma 8%
• Scotch whisky: India's tariff falls 150% → 75% immediately, then to 40% by year 10. Autos: UK concessions for Indian electric, hybrid and hydrogen passenger cars — duty-free within an annual quota
• Services / Mode 4: commitments across all 12 major service sectors and 137 sub-sectors, covering >99% of India's services export interest (IT/ITeS, financial, professional — consultancy/architecture/engineering, education). No Economic Needs Test (ENT) and no numerical restrictions on professionals travelling to the UK
• Double Contribution Convention (DCC), signed 10 February 2026, in force the same day — ends dual social-security contributions for Indian professionals posted to the UK for up to 5 years, cutting employment cost and raising take-home pay
• Bilateral trade ~US$56 bn, targeted at US$100–120 bn by 2030

India–New Zealand FTA Signed — Dairy Excluded (PIB / NZ MFAT, 27-04-2026)

• Signed 27 April 2026; negotiations launched March 2025 and concluded in ~9 months — New Zealand's fastest-ever FTA
• NZ exporters get tariffs removed/reduced on ~95% of current exports (sheep meat, wool, forestry, seafood, honey, wine, apples, kiwifruit) — but India excluded dairy and certain agricultural products almost entirely, protecting domestic farmers (the same red line that drove India out of RCEP)
• Not yet in force as of July 2026 — NZ enabling-bill submissions closed 19 July 2026; ratification targeted later in 2026

India–EFTA TEPA in Force — First Binding Investment Pledge in an Indian FTA (EFTA / PIB, 01-10-2025)

• Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement (TEPA) with EFTA — Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein — signed 10 March 2024, in force 1 October 2025; India's first FTA with a bloc of four developed European nations
• Article 7.1: EFTA commits US$100 billion in FDI and 1 million direct jobs over 15 years — US$50 bn in the first 10 years, US$50 bn in the next 5. This is the first legally-framed investment commitment in any Indian trade agreement
• Market access: EFTA opened 92.2% of its tariff lines (covering 99.6% of India's exports); India opened 82.7% (covering 95.3% of EFTA's exports), protecting dairy, soya, coal and sensitive agriculture

AITIGA Review & the "B-team of China" Remark (Indian Express / BW, 2025-26)

• Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal called the 2010 ASEAN–India Trade in Goods Agreement (AITIGA) "silly" and said some ASEAN members had become a "B-team of China" (India Global Forum, London) — arguing it exposed India to indirect Chinese imports through lax rules of origin
• India's ASEAN trade deficit widened from US$4.98 bn (2010-11) to US$44.20 bn (2024-25)
• The ASEAN co-chair of the AITIGA review formally conveyed displeasure over the tone and timing at the Kuala Lumpur review meeting; the AITIGA review remains the live negotiation

India–US Bilateral Trade Agreement — Still Unsigned (Bloomberg / Business Standard, July 2026)

• First-phase India–US BTA parked at the "last 1%" of legal text — no signed pact, no published document — as the interim US tariff arrangement counts down to its 24 July 2026 expiry
• US to lower the Reciprocal Tariff on India from 25% to 18%; the additional 25% tariff tied to Russian-oil purchases removed in recognition of India's commitment to stop buying it
• Key sticking point: tariff competitiveness — India wants terms better than its ASEAN peers get, a live case of third-country competition. Modi and Trump directed officials at the June G-7 pull-aside to fast-track it

Timor-Leste Becomes ASEAN's 11th Member (ASEAN Secretariat, 26-10-2025)

• Admitted at the 47th ASEAN Summit, Kuala Lumpur — ASEAN's first expansion since Cambodia in 1999. Applied 2011; agreed in principle with observer status 2022; roadmap adopted 2023
• ASEAN is now 11 members — but note that RCEP negotiations (2012–19) involved ASEAN-10 + 6, i.e. 16 countries

Modi's Australia Visit, Melbourne — Five Deliverables (The Hindu op-ed by Australian High Commissioner Philip Green, 20-07-2026; visit 8–10 July 2026)

• PM Modi visited Australia 8–10 July 2026; the Modi–Albanese meeting in Melbourne (9 July) produced five named outcomes:
• Joint Declaration on Defence and Security Cooperation — a significant upgrade of the 2009 security pact, positioning the two as "a force for peace, stability and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific"
• Partnership on Cyber, Critical Technologies and Supply Chains — strengthens respective cyber capabilities, regional/global cyber resilience, and industrial-business linkages
• Statement on Energy Security — commits both to resilient energy supply chains and, critically, makes possible Australian uranium exports to India for peaceful purposes (supports India's 100 GW nuclear capacity by 2047 target)
• Maritime Security Collaboration Roadmap — expands cooperation across the Indian Ocean that lies between the two shores
• A "sports playbook" — leverages Australian expertise in hosting major events as India bids to host the Commonwealth Games and the Olympic/Paralympic Games
• Investment: AustralianSuper, Australia's largest pension fund, will invest half a billion dollars (~₹3,360 crore) in India's National Investment and Infrastructure Fund Limited (NIIF) — on top of Australian hyperscalers committing tens of billions of dollars in data centres across India
• Education: eight Australian universities have undertaken to open foreign branch campuses in India — including the University of New South Wales (UNSW), a global top-20 university, which on opening later in 2026 will be the highest-ranking university operating in India (enabled by NEP 2020 / UGC foreign-campus regulations)
• Culture: an annual showcase branded "G'Day – Namaste", to coincide with Australia's Big Bash League playing its first game on foreign soil, in India, in December 2026
• The three "underlying drivers" the High Commissioner names: (a) both are reliable partners at a time when the region and world are in flux; (b) highly complementary economies — Australian strengths in energy, mining, education and skills fit India's rapidly growing manufacturing; (c) the Indian diaspora in Australia is that country's fastest-growing community
• (Read critically: this is an op-ed by Australia's High Commissioner to India — an official, promotional source. Use it for facts and deliverables; do not adopt its celebratory tone as analysis.)

WTO Regional Trade Agreements — the Count (WTO RTA Database, 17-07-2026)

• 386 RTAs notified and in force — 350 under GATT Article XXIV, 221 under GATS Article V, 65 under the Enabling Clause; plus at least 79 more in force but not yet notified to the WTO (as of June 2026)
• India: 15 FTAs covering 27 nations (GTRI, June 2026)

India–Canada: A Defence and Critical-Minerals Reset (The Hindu op-ed, 21-07-2026 — Chris Cooter, High Commissioner for Canada to India)

• The framing: written by Canada's envoy, this marks an "historic shift" in Canada–India relations after years of estrangement — the relationship is being rebuilt around defence industrial cooperation and critical minerals rather than only trade and diaspora issues
• The institutional steps:
• Prime Ministers Mark Carney and Narendra Modi agreed to establish a Defence Dialogue, and Defence Advisers have been re-accredited in both Ottawa and Delhi
• Canadian and Indian navies have participated in the Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) and Talisman Sabre exercises
• In June 2026 a delegation from India's National Defence College visited Canada, opening direct exchanges between military colleges
• Canada has established a national Defence Investment Agency to streamline military procurement, and launched a Defence Industrial Strategy to diversify supply chains so that "Canada does not rely on just one country" — the explicit invitation to India is co-development, subsystem manufacturing and sustainment
• Canada's defence-spending trajectory (Prelims-usable): Canada is on track to spend 5% of GDP on defence by 2035; in March 2026 it surpassed 2% of GDP. PM Carney's stated rationale, at CANSEC 2026 (27 May 2026): "the very nature of war is rapidly evolving, driven by the proliferation of drones, autonomous systems, and weapons in orbit"
• Critical minerals — the numbers to remember: Canada has reserves of 31 critical minerals, from cobalt to helium; it holds the tenth-largest reserves of rare earth elements; the third-largest recoverable resources of uranium; and 5% of the world's tungsten reserves. It is the second-largest producer and exporter of uranium globally, with 24% of global production in 2024
• The agreement: an India–Canada Memorandum of Understanding on the Critical Minerals Value Chain was signed during PM Carney's visit to India in February–March 2026, laying the groundwork for integrating stable, resilient supply chains between the two countries
• Complementarity (the argument for an answer): Canada has a full-spectrum aerospace sector (the world's third-largest domestic aviation market), strengths in satellite technology and space robotics (the RADARSAT constellation), and is R&D-focused; India brings scale, manufacturing capacity, low-cost platforms and an expanding industrial base, and is focused on advancing innovation capacity and high-end manufacturing. Canada is investing half a billion dollars in next-generation aerospace technologies, including a drone innovation hub
• The strategic logic: "Amid the crisis in West Asia, national security and economic security are inextricably linked" — and critical minerals are "the building blocks of defence technologies", making minerals policy a defence question rather than a purely commercial one
• The soft-power coda: the envoy invokes the Kirkee War Cemetery in Pune, where members of the Royal Canadian Air Force killed during the Second World War are buried — "our countries have stood shoulder to shoulder in the past, not just on the battlefield but for the shared security of our countries"

CLARIFICATION — read this as diplomatic advocacy, not neutral analysis. The piece is authored by Canada's High Commissioner and is therefore a positioning document. It makes no mention of the 2023–24 rupture over the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, the reciprocal expulsion of diplomats, or the suspension of trade talks — the very reasons a "reset" is needed. Use the facts and the complementarity argument, but in an answer state the estrangement and its causes explicitly; an answer that presents India–Canada ties as smoothly ascendant will read as uninformed.

---

Mains

(Analysis, dimensions, significance, critique, policy angles — for 10/15 mark answers)

Building a Shipbuilding Powerhouse with Korean Help (The Hindu, 26-06-2026)

• Why shipbuilding is strategic: it is capital-, labour- and technology-intensive, anchors a vast ancillary ecosystem, earns export revenue, and underpins maritime/defence self-reliance and the blue economy — but India is a minor player dominated by China, South Korea and Japan
• The Korean model & its transfer: Korea's cluster-led rise (Ulsan) offers a template; the MoUs bring design/engineering expertise, production know-how, workforce development and ancillary localisation that India lacks. Success needs sustained policy + fiscal support, low-cost long-term capital (SFCL), regulatory predictability, and academia–industry linkages — and State + Centre coordination to clear approval bottlenecks (the TN greenfield project)
• De-risking caution: the sector remains exposed to external shocks (supply chains, demand cycles) and must compete with a heavily-subsidised China — so it needs "hand-holding until self-sufficient"
• UPSC angle: India–South Korea relations, shipbuilding & blue economy, Maritime Vision 2030/2047 & Sagarmala, cluster-led industrialisation, technology transfer & Make-in-India (see [infrastructure-investment])

Trade & Tech Diplomacy with the West (Indian Express, 04-06-2026)

• UK–India CETA significance: A flagship FTA with a G7 economy — market access for Indian goods/services + a template as India negotiates with the EU and (interim) US; the Vision 2030 annual review institutionalises follow-through beyond signing
• Beyond trade: The Technology Security Initiative signals partnerships are now built around critical & emerging tech, defence and supply-chain security, not just tariffs — India diversifying tech ties away from single-source dependence
• Venezuela = energy & autonomy: Engaging an OPEC oil producer despite Western sanctions reflects India's strategic-autonomy, diversified-energy-sourcing approach (cf. discounted Russian oil)
• UPSC angle: India–UK FTA/CETA, strategic partnerships, technology security, India's multi-alignment, energy diplomacy & strategic autonomy

"Maturing Approach" — CETA and the Task of Turning Market Access into Market Share (The Hindu editorial, 20-07-2026)

• The editorial's thesis (a strong opening line for any FTA answer): "CETA's success lies in turning market access into market share." Access is a legal entitlement; share must be earned by competitive firms
• The "maturing" claim — what changed in India's negotiating posture: CETA reflects a more mature approach to free-trade negotiations. Unlike the 2009 ASEAN FTA, which "tilted the trade balance against India", New Delhi approached the UK pact by balancing liberalisation against domestic sensitivities amid an increasingly fragmented global trading system. The same shift was visible in the New Zealand FTA, where India protected its sensitive dairy sector despite dairy being one of NZ's biggest exports — i.e. India has learnt to defend red lines while still signing
• The uneven-benefits warning: gains "are likely to be uneven across sectors" and could place competitive pressure on already cost-disadvantaged MSMEs
• The real barrier is non-tariff, not tariff: smaller firms "often lack the documentation and compliance capacity" to claim preferences; and MSMEs may find the UK's stringent sanitary, phytosanitary, technical and sustainability standards a bigger hurdle than tariffs. (This is the operational reason behind the low FTA-utilisation paradox recorded below.)
• Why past agreements underdelivered — three causes named: low awareness, cumbersome administration, and high compliance costs
• The scale caveat that keeps expectations honest: the UK accounts for only ~3% of India's merchandise exports and ~1% of its imports. CETA's value is qualitative — access to a high-income market where India already runs a merchandise trade surplus — not volume
• The mechanism that could erode that surplus: the advantage narrows if imports of the UK's relatively price-inelastic exports (e.g. luxury vehicles — demand barely falls when duty is cut, so volumes rise) grow faster than India's largely labour-intensive, price-sensitive exports. A precise, quotable asymmetry
• Two further dilutions flagged: (a) the Double Contribution Convention helps Indian IT and professional-services firms but its economy-wide benefits may remain modest; (b) the pact faced a hurdle over the UK's steel safeguard quotas before implementation — "underlining how non-tariff measures can dilute market access" even after a deal is signed
• The climate-trade risk: India's carbon-intensive exports could face challenges as climate-related trade regulations tighten (CBAM) — a duty-free tariff line is worth little against a carbon border levy
• What determines whether it works — the global evidence: such agreements have accelerated export diversification, attracted investment and facilitated technology transfer — but only when supported by robust industrial ecosystems and competitive firms. Domestically, India must strengthen regulatory administration, intellectual property protection and dispute resolution
• UPSC angle: FTA design & sensitivities, non-tariff barriers & SPS/TBT measures, MSME competitiveness & compliance capacity, price elasticity and trade balances, CBAM & green protectionism, market access vs market share, India–UK CETA (see industrial-policy-manufacturing and the class note on trade agreements)

CLARIFICATION — two ASEAN deficit figures in this file. The 20-07-2026 editorial cites the India–ASEAN trade deficit widening from ~$10 bn in 2017 to nearly $44 bn in 2023; the GTRI-based entry below cites US$4.98 bn (2010-11) → US$44.20 bn (2024-25). These are not contradictory — different base years and different reporting bases (calendar vs fiscal year). Both endpoints converge on ~$44 bn, which is the figure to quote. Prefer the fiscal-year GTRI series for precision and state the year explicitly.

India's FTA Paradox — Signing Spree, Low Utilisation, Widening Deficits (GTRI report, June 2026)

• The paradox: India now has 15 FTAs covering 27 nations and is negotiating more (US, EU, others) — yet Indian exporters use only 20–30% of available preferences, against 60–70% utilisation by partner-country exporters using the same agreements, and 70–80% in many developed economies. The India–Australia ECTA is the outlier at ~84%; India's older Asian FTAs run at 50–60%
• Why utilisation stays low: limited MSME awareness, underdeveloped certification infrastructure, and complex rules-of-origin compliance whose fixed costs fall hardest on small firms
• Deficits widened with almost every partner: between 2007-09 and 2023-25, India's trade deficit rose 381% with ASEAN, 318% with Japan, 268% with South Korea. Over the five years to FY24 (GTRI, May 2024), exports to FTA partners grew ~14.5% (US$107.20 → 122.72 bn) while imports from them grew ~38% (to US$187.92 bn); FTA partners were 28% of India's total trade
• The structural charge: FTAs have aggravated India's inverted duty structure — duties on raw materials and inputs exceeding those on finished goods — making imports cheaper and incentivising firms to shift manufacturing to Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia
• Adverse margin of preference: because developed partners' tariffs are already near zero (Switzerland, New Zealand ~99% of goods duty-free for everyone) while India's simple average applied MFN tariff is 15.8% (WTO World Tariff Profiles 2025), India concedes far more tariff ground than it gains — and partners keep non-tariff measures out of the deal so the stick remains available
• UPSC angle: FTA utilisation & trade deficits, rules of origin & CAROTAR/§28DA, inverted duty structure, adverse margin of preference, third-country competition, trade agreements vs multilateralism (Bhagwati's spaghetti-bowl critique) (see industrial-policy-manufacturing and the class note on trade agreements)