Annual Report 2007 - Observer Research Foundation

Nasscom vice-president Rajdeep Sahrawat, Dr.Lin Chase, Director of Accenture Technology
Lab, Professor Arvind Kudchadkar of ORF, Swaminathan Krishnan, Chief Marketing Officer, Sasken
Technologies and Swati Sukumar, Anand & Anand Advocates took part in the panel discussions.
“THE RISE OF CHINA: ASIAN AND EUROPEAN PERSPECTIVE”
ORF and Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, who had been organising conferences on various themes every
year, this year chose “The Rise of China: Asian and European Perspective” as the conference theme.
Member of Parliament and CPI-M polit buro member Mr. Sitaram Yechury inaugurated the two-day
international conference on 23 November 2006 at the ORF campus. In his inaugural address, Mr.
Yechury said said India should be ready to explore the chances of a new world order in which India
and China complemented each other. He said the rise of China should be seen as a positive development
rather than as an negative one which will be a danger to India.
Mr. Yechury, who had recently led a party delegation to China, said the rise of China along with
India would lead to a new economic, political, military world order, which would also lead to democratization
of more countries. He said it was not correct to say that the rise of China could be a threat
to India or would lead to encroaching of space for India. Instead, he argued that the rise of China and
India would lead to expansion of space for both the countries in the world order, in terms of economic,
military, political and international relations. He argued that this in turn would reduce the space occupied
countries led by the United States and lead to a multipolar, egalitarian world instead of the
unipolar world which the US is trying to build.
Besides India, scholars from China, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Russia and Germany
presented papers and took part in the discussions. The conference discussed China’s Strategic
Culture and Current Political Dynamics, China’s Economical Potential, Rise of China: Implications
for Regional Security, China’s Energy Needs, Military Developments in China and China’s Technological
and Military Industrial Complex. The conference was organised by the Institute of Security
Studies, ORF, under the guidance of General (Retd.) V.P. Malik, the president of the ISS. The deliberations
of the conference would be published in the form of a book.
(left to right)
● Mr. Kiran Karnik,
President, Nasscom,
and Dr. S. Narayan
at the ORF-Nasscom
conference.
● Ms. Francine Frankel
and Amb. K. Raghunath
at the ORF-CASI
conference.
● Mr. Jorg Schultz (RLF)
speaks at the ORF-RLF
conference.
EMAJOR
EVENTS
“POWER REALIGNMENTS IN ASIA”
ORF and the Penn Arts and Sciences, Centre for Advanced Study of India of the Pennsylvania University,
organised a four-day conference of thought leaders from both the countries on “Power Realignments
in Asia: A US-India Policy Dialogue” from 14 December at the ORF campus. Dr. Marshall
M. Bouton, President of Chicago Council on Global Affairs, was the special guest speaker. Again, the
focus was on the rise of China and its implications for foreign policies of India and the United States.
The theme was discussed in eight in-depth sessions.
Annual Report 2007 ◆ Observer Research Foundation
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