India does not have an ‘exit policy’ in Afghanistan, External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid has assured even as he urged more Indian groups to scout for business opportunities and visiting Afghan Foreign Minister rejected ‘doomsday’ predictions for his country.
“We in India have no exit policy. We are not going anywhere unless you want us to go.
“As long as you want us to be there, we will be there,” Khurshid said at the inauguration of a two-day conference on ‘Doing Business with Afghanistan’ here on Monday.
“We have an open arms approach to Afghanistan, our destinies are interlinked,” said Khurshid.
He took the help of the 1961 Hindi film, based on short story by Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore, Kabuliwala, to show how commerce linked both the countries.
“Indian business sees enormous opportunity in Afghanistan’s stability,” Khurshid noted, adding that Afghanistan could become a stepping stone to Central Asia and beyond.
Referring to the Chabahar port in Iran, which India is upgrading, Khurshid said it would help in evacuation of minerals mined in Afghanistan. On the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India ( TAPI) pipeline project, Khurshid said he was hopeful that it would soon be a reality.
Hoping that the democratic process in that country would be successful, he said destinies of both the nations are interlinked and emergence of a stable Afghanistan would help the entire region.
India has one of its largest development partnership budgets at $2 billion for the war-ravaged country.
Afghanistan is facing twin challenges in 2014 -- presidential elections and start of withdrawal of foreign troops.
Afghan Finance Minister Hazrat Omar Zakhilwal was emphatic that all ‘doomsday predictions’ that talk about Taliban over-running the country post-2014, were ‘totally flawed’.
“Afghanistan in 2014 and beyond will be more stable, unified and prosperous,” said Zakhilwal, adding, “You can’t compare Afghanistan of today with that of 10 years ago.” Zakhilwal said the Afghan security forces, which have taken over, are able to not only maintain security but also ‘improve upon it’.
He said his country was full of young aspiring people, with many of them educated in India, and eager to move forward.
Zakhilwal said his country was more integrated today and the mobile phone had reached right down to the interiors.
Of the 30 million population, 18.5 million had access to mobile phones.