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| His Excellency Mr. Avinash Chandra Gupta, High Commissioner of India meeting with Premier Amory on his official visit to the island. |
Charlestown Nevis (March 18, 2004) Newly designated High Commissioner of India to the Federation of St Kitts and Nevis, His Excellency Mr. Avinash Chandra Gupta, on Wednesday 17 met and held discussions with Premier the Hon Vance Amory at his office, Administration Building in Charlestown.
The High Commissioner who has been based in Georgetown, Guyana for the past seven months, and attached to the Caricom region, told the Government Information Services at an exclusive interview that the discussions were generally mutual.
He said, “Basically, the focus of discussion is what we can do together to make this region and the world a better and safer place to live in.” He noted that the Caricom region was of utmost importance to the government of India and that his government would like to see the islands of Caricom come together and do something concrete.
Said Ambassador Gupta, “I am very positive we can have some joint projects here, because we (India Government) have very good relations with most Caribbean countries, and we share the same colonial past, so language is not a problem and on international issues we speak with one voice, so I personally see there’s a lot we can do with the countries in this region.”
The Ambassador, who has been a diplomat for over twenty years, in responding to a question of technical assistance to the region, said that the government of India had a programme known as “Indian Technical Economy Cooperation Programme” that was born out of a desire to share the development of India with other developing countries.
He observed that his government and the people of India, also call the programme, ‘South, South Cooperation’, in that the country produced about 250 million tons of food grains every year and would like to share with the developing countries whether its from the Caribbean or African countries or Asia.
Gupta expressed his hope that the government and people of India can mould the type of programme to meet the particular requirements of the region, adding, “I shall be too happy to.”
In sharing his feeling with the government press, Ambassador Gupta felt that India was not very well known to the island (Nevis) and that his country has made several strikes which could filter down to the region. “I got a clear mandate from my government to forge a very close relationship so that we can share with each other experiences because in today’s world you cannot keep things to yourself, you have to share with each other to go further,” ended Ambassador Gupta.
