NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe had wide-ranging bilateral discussions which include an oil pipeline, ferry connectivity, UPI, trade-in rupee, a possible land route and increased air connectivity, amongst other things.
Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe arrived in New Delhi a day earlier for the official visit, his first since taking up the top job last year after an economic meltdown forced his predecessor to flee.
"Today we have adopted a vision document for our Economic Partnership. This vision is to strengthen the Maritime, Air, Energy and people-to-people connectivity between the people of both countries. The vision is to accelerate mutual cooperation in tourism, power, trade, higher education and skill development. This is the vision - of India's long-term commitment towards Sri Lanka," said PM Modi.
"My visit to India has provided an opportunity to review our bilateral relationship, leverage the strength of geographical and civilizational links, reinforced trust and confidence for our future prosperity in the modern world," Wickremesinghe said.
PM Modi conveyed to President Wickremesinghe India's expectations from Colombo to fulfil the aspirations of the Tamil community in the island nation and ensure a life of respect and dignity for it. He also sought a humane approach from Sri Lanka over conflicts involving the island nation's navy and fishermen from Tamil Nadu.
"We hope that Sri Lankan government will fulfil aspirations of the Tamils as this would drive the process of equality, justice and peace and fulfil the commitment to the 13th Amendment and conduct the Provincial Council Elections," PM Modi added.
The Tamil community in Sri Lanka has been demanding the implementation of the 13th Amendment that provides for devolution of power to it. The 13th Amendment had been brought in after the Indo-Sri Lankan agreement of 1987.
This year, India is celebrating its 75th anniversary of diplomatic ties with Sri Lanka. Tamil nationals have been a native of the island nation for over 200 years now and to mark this, India has earmarked Rs 75 crore for projects that cater to the development programmes of the Tamil community.
Meanwhile, talks on the Economic and Technological Cooperation Agreement (ETCA) will begin soon.
The two leaders spoke about enhancing air connectivity and beginning a passenger ferry service between Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu and KankeSanthurai in Sri Lanka.
"We have decided that the work of connecting the electricity grids between the two countries will be expedited. The feasibility study will be done for the petroleum pipeline between India and Sri Lanka. Apart from this, it was also decided to check the feasibility of a land bridge. Fintech connectivity will also increase with the agreement signed today to launch UPI in Sri Lanka," PM Modi added.
India provided critical financial and humanitarian assistance worth over USD 4 billion to its neighbour, including food, medicine and fuel, aimed at injecting much-needed stability as its bankrupt neighbour battled outstanding total debt of over USD 83 billion, of which USD 41.5 billion was foreign.
Earlier on Friday, President Ranil also had an interaction with industrialist Gautam Adani and they held talks on port development. "We had a discussion around continuing development of the Colombo Port West Container Terminal, a 500 MW wind project and extending our renewal energy expertise to produce green hydrogen,’’ Adani said after the meeting.
While modalities are yet to be worked out for the projects that have been spoken about, investments are an option that would be considered as private companies are involved in some projects.
Here is a list of agreements on the pipeline between the neighbouring nations:
Maritime connectivity:
To cooperate in the development of ports and logistics infrastructure at Colombo, Trincomalee and Kankesanthurai with an aim to consolidate regional logistics and shipping, as per mutual understanding.
To resume passenger ferry services between Nagapattinam in India and Kankesanthurai in Sri Lanka and work towards early resumption of ferry services between Rameshwaram and Talaimannar, and other mutually agreed places.
Air connectivity:
The resumption of flights between Jaffna and Chennai has enhanced people-to-people ties and agreed to further expand it to Colombo as well as explore connectivity between Chennai and Trincomalee, Batticaloa and other destinations in Sri Lanka.
To encourage and strengthen investment and cooperation in civil aviation, including augmentation of airport infrastructure at Palaly for greater economic benefits to the people.
III. Energy and Power connectivity:
MoU on cooperation in developing renewable energy would develop Sri Lanka’s significant renewable energy potential, including offshore wind and solar, thus enabling Sri Lanka to achieve its target of generating 70 per cent of power requirements from renewable energy sources by 2030.
To establish a high-capacity power grid interconnection between India and Sri Lanka to enable bidirectional electricity trade between Sri Lanka and other regional countries, including the BBIN countries, which has the potential to not only bring down the costs of electricity in Sri Lanka but also help create a valuable and dependable source of foreign exchange for Sri Lanka.
To expedite the implementation of the understanding reached on the Sampur Solar power project and LNG infrastructure, and explore cooperation in green hydrogen and green ammonia through the use of innovative technologies with an aim to increase the renewable energy mix in power generation of Sri Lanka.
Ongoing cooperation in the development of Trincomalee Tank Farms is a reflection of our endeavour to develop mutually beneficial cooperation projects in the Trincomalee area and agreed to further develop Trincomalee as a national and regional hub of industry, energy and economic activity on the basis of mutual understanding.
To cooperate for the construction of a multi-product petroleum pipeline from the Southern part of India to Sri Lanka with an aim to ensure an affordable and reliable supply of energy resources to Sri Lanka.
To undertake mutually agreed joint exploration and production of hydrocarbons in Sri Lanka’s offshore basins with an aim to develop Sri Lanka’s upstream petroleum sector.
IV. Trade, Economic and Financial Connectivity:
That salience of bilateral trade and economic engagements was significantly demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic and economic crisis in Sri Lanka and agreed to facilitate mutual investments through, inter alia, policy consistency, promoting ease of doing business and fair treatment of each other’s investors.
To facilitate investments from India in the divestment of Sri Lankan State-owned Enterprises and in manufacturing/economic zones in various sectors in Sri Lanka.
To undertake discussions on the Economic and Technology Cooperation Agreement with an aim to comprehensively enhance bilateral trade and investments in new and priority areas.
The decision to designate INR as currency for trade settlements between the two countries has forged stronger and mutually-beneficial commercial linkages and agreed to operationalise UPI-based digital payments for further enhancing trade and transactions between businesses and common people.
India’s rapid digitalisation is an important force-multiplier for ongoing transformational changes in India, both in economic development and governance, and agreed to leverage India’s Digital Public Infrastructure in accordance with Sri Lanka’s requirements and priorities towards effective and efficient delivery of citizen-centric services to the people of Sri Lanka;
V. People-to-people Connectivity:
To promote awareness and popularize India’s Buddhist circuit, and Ramayana trail as well as ancient places of Buddhist, Hindu and other religious worship in Sri Lanka for enhancing tourism.
To explore cooperation between educational institutions on both sides including through the establishment of new higher education and skilling campuses in Sri Lanka in accordance with Sri Lanka’s requirements and priorities.
To expand cooperation between research and academic institutes in areas of mutual interests such as agriculture, aquaculture, IT, business, finance and management, health and medicine, earth and marine sciences, oceanography, space applications, as well as history, culture, languages, literature, religious studies and other humanities.
To establish land connectivity between Sri Lanka and India for developing land access to the ports of Trincomalee and Colombo, propelling economic growth and prosperity in both Sri Lanka and India, and further consolidating the millennia-old relationship between the two countries. A feasibility study for such connectivity will be conducted at an early date.
Both the leaders directed respective officials concerned to expedite the realisation of this shared vision, which will not only impart long-term direction and significant momentum to bilateral cooperation for growth and prosperity in both countries and in the wider region but also set the future direction of a dynamic India-Sri Lanka relationship, founded on enhanced mutual confidence and trust.