Amid tensions, Maldives' cadets to participate in India's Republic Day parade

New Delhi: Notwithstanding the strains in ties between New Delhi and Malé, the young cadets of the Maldives will take part in the military parade on the occasion of the Republic Day ceremony of India on January 26.

A group of young officials of the island councils of the Maldives will also undergo training at the National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRDPR) in Hyderabad in India over the next couple of weeks. Fathimath Yamaany Habeeb, a psychologist and an officer of the Maldives Correctional Service, will be at the National Forensic Sciences University (NFSU) in Ahmedabad for the next few years, pursuing a doctorate, fully supported by a scholarship from the Indian Council of Cultural Relations.

The relations between New Delhi and Malé have come under stress over the past few months after Mohamed Muizzu won the elections in September 2023, defeating his predecessor Ibrahim Mohamed Solih. But India is continuing to nurture its people-to-people ties with the Maldives, including by continuing its capacity-building programmes for the officials of the neighbouring archipelago.

New Delhi’s mission in Malé is facilitating the visit of an official of the city council of the Addu island of the Maldives to India. She will undergo training on “International Labour Standards and Promotion of Gender Equality at Workplace” till February 2 at V V Giri National Labour Institute in Noida.

Another official of the Ministry of Economic Development of the Maldives is undergoing a specialised training programme on “Trade Remedies under WTO, TRIMS, WTO Disputes and RTAs” at the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade in New Delhi.

New Delhi’s envoy to Malé, Munu Mahawar, had a meeting with Mariyam Zulfa, who heads the Local Government Authority of the Maldives on the sideline of the ceremony to mark the departure of the 29 officials of the island councils of the archipelago for undergoing the training programme at the NIRDPR in India. It was the fourth batch of local government officials coming from the Maldives to India to undergo the training.

“Look forward to working together to advance our ongoing capacity building and community development cooperation in accordance with the priorities of Government of Maldives,” Mahawar posted on X after his meeting with Zulfa.

Muizzu’s campaign for the presidential polls in September 2023 saw him opposing and promising to reverse Solih’s ‘India First’ policy of treating India as a preferred partner for the Maldives and lessening its reliance on China. He kept his poll promise and formally asked India to withdraw all its military personnel from the Maldives immediately after taking oath on November 17.

The Muizzu Government recently stated that India had 88 military personnel in the Maldives. Most of them are deployed to operate and fly two Dornier aircraft and a helicopter gifted by India to the Maldives for emergency evacuation of people from the islands. Muizzu, himself, acknowledged the role of India’s military personnel in the emergency evacuation of people from the remote islands of the Maldives – during his meeting with the union minister Kiren Rijiju a day after taking oath in Malé.

After his recent visit to Beijing amid an escalating row with New Delhi, Muizzu, however, set March 15 as the deadline for India to withdraw the military personnel from the Maldives. His government also decided not to renew an agreement that allowed India to conduct hydrographic surveys in the territorial waters of the Maldives.

Notwithstanding the Muizzu Government’s move to steer the Indian Ocean nation into China’s orbit of geopolitical influence, New Delhi is set to host a group of cadets of the Maldivian National Cadet Corps to participate in the Republic Day parade in the national capital of India on January 26. They will also visit Agra and Jaipur, apart from meeting the dignitaries, according to a post by the High Commission of India in Malé on X.