Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has warned that disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz are not distant events but stark realities with direct implications for India's security and economic stability, even as the ongoing conflict in West Asia has resulted in a blockade of the strategic strait.
Addressing the German Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence and Security on the first day of his three-day visit, he also said the world is facing new security threats, and that technological transformation has made the situation highly complex and interconnected.
"A new approach with the willingness to adapt to the changing environment is the need of the hour," the minister said on Tuesday.
Singh also made a strong pitch for enhanced collaboration between the defence industrial ecosystems of India and Germany. His visit comes amid the West Asia conflict, which has stretched for more than 50 days and has global ramifications.
"For a developing country like India, which relies on the West Asian region for a significant share of its energy requirements, disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz are not distant events, they are stark realities with direct implications for our security and economic stability," Singh said.
He highlighted that in view of these challenges and their direct implications, India has adopted a proactive and coordinated strategy.
To deal with modern-day global challenges, Singh underscored the need for coordinated responses and trusted strategic partnerships.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz have placed strong emphasis on advancing this strategic partnership, he said.
"We also see a clear convergence of views at the European Union level, reflected in the growing momentum to engage with India, including through the India-EU Defence and Strategic Partnership," Singh said.
He asserted that Aatmanirbhar Bharat is not merely a procurement programme for India, but "an invitation to co-create, co-develop, and co-innovate."
"We recognise the established strengths of Germany's leading industrial enterprises, while also admiring the vigour and dynamism of the renowned German Mittelstand (small and medium-sized companies) in advanced and emerging technologies," Singh said.
"In India too, our start-ups and enterprising private companies are rapidly enhancing and complementing the capabilities of our larger and established defence enterprises. This is an area where India and Germany naturally complement each other, and our partnership can deepen further," he added.
Singh also reiterated that the two nations are not only strategic partners, but also consequential voices in shaping the global discourse of the present times.
"We are established democracies bound by shared values and dynamic economies driven by resilience, innovation and a determined industrial spirit. As lawmakers and esteemed members of the Committee, your guidance, voice and support can further strengthen and enrich the future course of our defence and strategic cooperation," the minister said.
"When the chronicles of this era are penned, the India-Germany partnership will stand as a paragon of diplomacy, crafted not in response to crisis, but through the steady resolve of two mature democracies choosing to walk this path together," he added.
Singh pointed out that the current geopolitical instability can no longer be viewed as regional matters.
Their consequences are global in scope, he said, describing them as not localised disturbances, but serious developments with far-reaching implications for energy security, food security and global economic stability, apart from the immense humanitarian cost they entail.
Upon his arrival, Singh was welcomed at the Berlin Airport with military honours. He was flown in a Special German Air Force aircraft, escorted by fighter jets, during his flight from Munich to Berlin, the Defence Ministry said in a statement.
Earlier, Singh paid floral tribute to Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore at the premises of the Humboldt University in Berlin, underscoring the enduring cultural and intellectual ties between India and Germany, it said.
