Union minister for railways, consumer affairs, commerce and industry Piyush Goyal was speaking at Startup India’s international summit, Prarambh , hosted by the department for promotion of industry and internal trade (DPIIT), ministry of commerce and industry, government of India.
The latest resurgence of COVID-19 gives the year 2021 a tepid start. Speaking of the activity calendar of BIMSTEC, leaders and diplomatic officials might wonder how the major meeting in Bangkok this year will be conducted considering the travel restrictions brought about by the pandemic.
2021 is a very important year for Thailand, which will succeed Sri Lanka as chairman of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) for 2021. Thailand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has planned in advance to make the event high profile as it is to mark the 24
th anniversary of BIMSTEC, which indeed was conceived in Bangkok on 6 June 1997.
NEW DELHI, Jan 15: Union Minister Piyush Goyal on Friday exhorted Indian investors to eye the BIMSTEC nations for greater engagement through investments,
As the name suggests, the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation, or BIMSTEC, is a regional bloc devoted to coordinating development projects in the countries around the rim of the eastern Indian Ocean. But the fact that the seven-member alliance includes not only India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand but also land-locked Nepal and Bhutan suggests a wider agenda. BIMSTEC was founded in 1997 and not by coincidence at time when China, for the first time since seafarer Zheng He sailed his fleets across the Indian Ocean in the 15
th century, began to flex its muscles in a maritime region that India has long considered to be its “own lake.”
The Bay of Bengal is a strategic location brimming with infinite potential yet to be tapped. The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC), comprising of the seven member states of South and Southeast Asia, is a distinctive subregional initiative in terms of both its political geography and proximity to the Bay. Being dormant for more than two decades since its formation, it is only in recent years that the subregion awoke towards the requirement of enhancing their regional commitment. Part of this realisation has been due to the overflowing eminence of the maritime space. Additionally, the subregion started gaining thrust, post the stagnation of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), which ambushed much of India’s economic stakes in the region. However, there is growing concern among several spectators that unless the current diplomatic ties between Bangladesh and Myanmar progress, the BIMSTEC initiative may suf