Will India host G-20 summit in 2019? Modi ups ante

Prime Minister Narendra Modi may push for holding the 2019 G-20 summit in New Delhi. The upcoming 12th G-20 summit is scheduled to be held on July 7 and 8 at the Hanseatic city of Hamburg, Germany. Indian officials are tight-lipped about the proposed venue of the 14th Summit. The only problem for holding the summit in 2019 is the Lok Sabha general election scheduled to be held the same year. Earlier, Indian diplomats had tried to host the summit in 2018 for which they had initiated discussions with some members on the issue. However, in June last year, the member countries approved Argentina's Presidency for G-20 2018.

Sources in the Government said that even if the summit is not held in the year 2019, the Prime Minister is nevertheless very keen to host this summit in India during his tenure. To receive some sort of commitment from the leaders of the other G-20 governments for holding the summit in India in the near future, will be one of the main objectives of the Indian delegation this time.

On July 7 and 8 almost 20 heads of the states and the Government will have a marathon session on shaping the world economy in the future. Prime Minister Modi will have another opportunity to meet US President Donald Trump, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of the summit. The external affairs ministry is tight-lipped at this moment, but they will have a detailed briefing on this important global summit.

Prime Minister Modi will have the opportunity to meet the Netherlands leadership while coming back from Washington. India will try to take a proactive stand this time in the G-20 summit in view of the US pull out from the Paris agreement on climate change.