 "External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar with Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim. ANI")
Malaysia’s Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim is en route to India.
Ibrahim’s visit on August 19 and 20 is likely to see several deals inked between the two nations.
Ibrahim, accompanied by a high-level delegation, will also be holding wide-ranging talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
This will be first visit by a Malaysian prime minister to India since 2018.
But what do we know about the ties between the two nations?
Let’s take a closer look:
Diplomatic ties
India and Malaysia (then the Federation of Malaya) established relations in 1957.
A close friendship between Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and his counterpart Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra reflected in strong ties between the nations in the 1960s.
Nehru was the first Indian prime minister to visit Malaysia in 1954.
He was followed by Indira Gandhi in 1968, VP Singh in 1990, PV Narasimha Rao in 1995, Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2001 and 2003, Manmohan Singh in 2005 and 2010 and Narendra Modi in 2015 and 2018.
Tunku Abdul Rahman (1962) was the first Malaysian prime minister to visit India in 1962.
King Yang- di- Pertuan Agong then twice visited India, followed by King V-AI-Sultan Almu’tasimu Billahi Muhibbuddin Tuanku Al-Haj Abdul Halim Mu’adzam Shah Ibni Al-Marhum Sultan Badlishah in 1974, Prime Minister Tun Hussein in 1979 and 1980), Prime Minister Dr Mahathir bin Mohamad in 1983, 1987, 1993, 1994, 1996, 1997 and 2002, Prime Minister Dato’ Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi in 2004 and Prime Minister Mohd Najib Tun Razak in 2010, 2012, 2017, and 2018.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsMalayasian prime minister Badawi and Razak also took steps to draw the nations closer together.
However, ties between the nations went to another level after Modi took office in 2014.
The bilateral relationship was elevated to an Enhanced Strategic Partnership during Modi’s 2015 visit.
Indian diaspora in Malaysia
Malaysia is home to the third largest Indian diaspora in the world – 2.9 million people.
Malaysia has 2.75 million Persons of Indian Origin (PIO).
Of these, 90 per cent speak Tamil, while the rest speak Telugu, Malayalam, Punjabi, Bengali, Gujarati, and Marathi.
There are approximately 185,000 NRIs both skilled and unskilled in Malaysia.
Indian High Commissioner to Malaysia, BN Reddy told ANI, “Malaysia has the second largest population of Indian-origin community. I would say there is a mini-India here even though Tamil speakers are the largest, but you also have the Malayalam, Telugu, Punjabi, Gujarati, and Odiya speaking populations, which provides a natural bridge for us to engage with Malaysia more deeply.”
Economics and trade
Trade ties between the two countries have also been on an upward trajectory.
Malaysia is India’s 13th largest trade partner and New Delhi’s third-largest trading partner in ASEAN.
India, meanwhile, is among Malaysia’s 10 biggest trade partners.
India exports mineral fuels, mineral oils, aluminum and related articles, meat and edible meat offal, iron and steel, copper and related articles, organic chemicals, nuclear reactors, boilers, machinery and mechanical appliances, electrical machinery and equipment, to Malaysia.
India imports palm oil, mineral fuels, mineral oils, electrical machinery and equipment, animal or vegetable fats and oils and their cleavage products, nuclear reactors, boilers, machinery and mechanical appliances; copper and articles thereof, wood; wood charcoal, aluminium, organic chemicals, iron and steel and miscellaneous chemical products from Malaysia.
As per Hindustan Times, Malaysia is the 26th largest investor in India.
Malaysian construction companies also have a massive footprint in India.
The two-way trade was around $20 billion in 2022-23 – and officials say that is only set to grow.
Sputnik quoted MEA vice-minister P Kumaran as saying at the India-ASEAN Start-up Summit 2023, “The trade basket is expanding, given the contemporary and complementary nature of our requirements and emerging opportunities. Our investment ties are also strong and growing.”
Reddy has said bilateral trade could touch $25 billion in the next three years.
“In any relationship, the real sustenance comes from economic and trade relations,” Reddy said. “The bilateral trade between India and Malaysia, currently at 20 billion dollars, will increase to 25 billion dollars in the next three years,” Reddy said.
“We are in the process of now realising the enhanced strategic partnership that was established during the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2015, where it was decided that our engagement with Malaysia would be taken to newer heights, wherein covering the entire spectrum of the relationship,” Reddy added.
India and Malaysia are in the process of firming up a framework for conducting trade in national currencies as well.
The two sides are also initiating a process to review the 12-year-old comprehensive economic cooperation agreement to include new domains and items.
Reddy also highlighted areas that are rife for potential collaboration including renewable energy and semiconductors
Malaysian company Petron has already invested billions of dollars in the renewable energy sector in India. Plans for a Malaysia-India Digital Council and an Annual Energy Dialogue further underscore the commitment to expanding collaboration.
“In the last six months, Malaysian company Petron has announced close to four and a half billion US dollars in the renewable energy sector in India," Reddy said. “We’re going to start another thing called Annual Energy Dialogue. Given the significant emphasis of both countries and having already close to USD 4 billion bilateral trade in fossil fuels, particularly oil and gas, we want to expand it to renewable energy."
Defence ties
India’s defence relations with Malaysia have gained momentum in recent years.
The MoU on defence cooperation, signed in 1993, is the cornerstone of defence relations between the two countries.
In July 2023, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh visited Kuala Lumpur during which both sides approved an amendment in the memorandum of understanding on India-Malaysia defence cooperation signed in 1993.
The defence ministry had said that the amendment will act as an “enabler” to expand bilateral defence cooperation in the areas of mutual interest.
Malaysia is among a handful of countries showing keen interest in procuring India’s indigenously developed Tejas aircraft.
Tejas is a single-engine multi-role fighter aircraft capable of operating in high-threat air environments.
As per The Diplomat, in 2022, India and Malaysia conducted three joint exercises – air force exercise Udara Shakti, naval exercise Samudara Laksamana, and army exercise Harimau Shakti.
“Malaysia, one of the original members of ASEAN, played a significant role in assisting India with its Look East policy, which was later turned into an Act East Policy and then into an Indo-Pacific strategy. Nonetheless, more exchanges at the political level are required”, former Ambassador Rajiv Bhatia, a distinguished fellow at Gateway House, told Sputnik India.
Tourism and humanitarian outreach
India is a significant priority market for Malaysia as the two countries share strong economic ties and cultural connections.
India is Malaysia’s fifth largest source of tourists.
The Government of Malaysia has thus announced visa-free travel for Indians from December 1, 2023, to December 31, 2024 to promote inbound tourism to Malaysia.
India has allowed Malaysian nationals to travel to India for tourism on a gratis 30-day double entry tourist visa since July, 1 2024
Malaysia was amongst the first few countries included into the Vande Bharat Mission Phase 1 in May 2020. Till March 2022, 1,10,000 Indians nationals were repatriated from Malaysia by over 670 flights under Vande Bharat Mission.
What do experts say?
That Ibrahim’s visit is a good chance to continue to rebuild ties between the two nations after the unpleasantness in 2019.
Malaysia-India relations were had been impacted when its former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad slammed India for scrapping Jammu and Kashmir’s special status and the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
Mohamad, speaking at the UN General Assembly in 2019, claimed that “New Delhi had invaded and occupied Kashmir.”
India had responded by changing its import rules to ban refined palm oil from Malaysia.
Bhatia added, During the tenure of Malaysian Prime Minister Abdul Razak Hussein, ties were both stable and growing. However, under Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad’s leadership, bilateral relations between Malaysia and India were strained.”
“The primary cause of Malaysia’s altered policy towards India is the shift in leadership,” Bhatia added.
Another bugbear for India is controversial preacher Zakir Naik, who has made Malaysia his home base.
New Delhi has sought the extradition of Naik, who faces money-laundering and incitement of charges in India.
But Bhatia predicted nothing but good things for the future.
He told Sputnik, “Initiatives are underway to find common ground for the normalisation of bilateral relations. With any luck, even more high-level interactions in 2024 will put the relationship on a more upward trajectory.”
With inputs from agencies