Prime Minister Narendra Modi will embark on a State visit to Mauritius, India’s close maritime neighbour and development partner, on March 11 and 12, to grace its national day celebrations as its Chief Guest.
He is visiting Mauritius after ten years. During this period, the relationship with Mauritius has deepened significantly.
A contingent of Indian defence forces will participate in the national day celebrations on March 12 along with a ship from the Indian Navy, according to the Ministry of External Affairs. The Aakash Ganga skydiving team of the Indian Air Force will also participate in the ceremonies.
During this visit, Prime Minister Modi and Prime Minister Ramgoolam will inaugurate a few projects that have been implemented with Indian assistance. They will also witness the signing of several MoUs on cooperation in the field of capacity building, bilateral trade, tackling cross-border financial crimes and promoting small and medium enterprises.
Notably, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar visited Mauritius in July last year, rather early in Modi’s third term, and observed that bilateral ties with Mauritius serves as a role model for India’s successful development collaboration abroad.
Replying to questions at a special media briefing here on Saturday, Foreign Secretary, Vikram Misri said that India and Mauritius expect to sign during the forthcoming visit, a technical agreement on sharing white-shipping information between the Indian Navy and Mauritius authorities.
He said that the agreements that will be signed, including the technical ones, are very important.
“The key agreement on sharing of white shipping information will help further advance the SAGAR vision,” he said.
He explained, “It will further enhance maritime security of Mauritius, safety of its trading corridors, and enhance regional cooperation in real-time sharing of data. It will enable Indian authorities and Mauritius authorities to cooperate in preventing illegal activities, improve Mauritius’ maritime domain awareness in the region.”
The Foreign Secretary explained that this will involve not just the Indian Navy, but also the Mauritius police force in an effort to combat these kinds of activities.
He said that an MoU is proposed to be concluded between the Enforcement Directorate and the Financial Crimes Commission of the Republic of Mauritius. “It essentially aims at providing intelligence and technical assistance cooperation on anti-corruption and anti-money laundering activities and it will also help in identifying emerging trends, knowledge exchange, and adapting to new methodologies in this particular area.”
Misri further said that the two countries plan to sign an MOU between the Ministry of Public Service and Administrative Reforms and the National Centre for Good Governance, essentially to undertake training of 500 Mauritian civil servants over five years at the National Centre for Good Governance.
An allied MOU that will also be signed between the Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) with the Ministry of Earth Sciences and the Prime Minister’s office from the Mauritius side, also establishes a comprehensive framework for cooperation on ocean observation, research and information management, and enhancing maritime zone management in Mauritius.
“This will involve a lot of technical activities such as ocean modeling and focus on capacity building and training in this particular area. There will be engagement on the latest technologies, collaboration on best practices, data management, remote sensing, etc,” he said.
Replying to another question, Misri said that India has already provided Mauritius with a Coast Guard ship, through a grant as well as loan assistance, the CGS Barracuda, and then through a soft loan, another platform which is the CGS Victory. “And in addition, there is a whole bunch of fast interceptor craft that were also provided to Mauritius. So, I think we have been providing them with these kinds of assets and if there is a need felt for more to be done in this regard, we would be ready to examine those proposals as well.”
On development partnership, Misri said that the consolidated portfolio of development assistance to Mauritius just in the last decade is nearly $1.1 billion. Of this, about $729 million is through lines of credit and nearly $427 million is through outright grant assistance.
“The bouquet of projects that has been executed includes everything from three phases of the Metro Express. This is one of the most striking things that you can see across the Mauritian landscape today. An ENT hospital, social housing units, the Supreme Court building, Civil Service College, which is going to be, I think, inaugurated during the coming visit. So, there is an area health center that will also be inaugurated during the coming visit. There is a scheme under which e-tablets were provided for school children, firefighting pumps, medical clinics, solar projects and I have already mentioned what we have done in terms of the naval and coast guard assets that we have provided.”
He said that the Prime Minister Modi’s visit in the coming week, is indeed timely.
The Foreign Secretary said that Prime Minister Modi was the first world leader to call and congratulate Prime Minister Navinchandra Ramgoolam for his electoral victory following the November 2024 elections.
He said that the visit next week will therefore provide an occasion for early engagement between the two leaders. “It will come right in the beginning of a fresh term of office for Prime Minister Ram Goolam and of course also for Prime Minister Modi in his third term in office. The visit will enable both sides to take stock of bilateral ties and provide orientation to engagement in the coming months and years.”
Misri reminded media persons that it was in Mauritius in 2015 that Prime Minister had articulated vision SAGAR (Security And Growth For All In The Region) which underscored India’s commitment to the Indian Ocean Region.
“The India-Mauritius relationship forms a very, very important pillar of our Vision SAGAR,” he said.
Prime Minister Modi will also interact with members of the Indian community, friends of India and socio-cultural organizations in Mauritius during the visit.
“Our relations with Mauritius are rooted in shared history, culture and a very strong and robust people to people relationship that goes back several centuries. Mauritius is one of our key partners in the Indian Ocean. It is a close maritime neighbour. We have been privileged to have been a preferred development partner for Mauritius and have undertaken several economic development and capacity building initiatives in Mauritius.India has also extended HADR (Humanitarian Assistance And Disaster Relief) support and provided necessary assistance in the augmentation of defense and maritime capabilities of Mauritius,” the Foreign Secretary said.
