India Ranked 4th Most Powerful Country, Lagging Behind China In Indo-Pacific Region: Asia Power Index 2021

According to Lowy’s report, India performs best in future resources measures and stands behind the US and China.

Asia Power Index 2021: India Ranked 4th Powerful Country | Getty Images

New Delhi: India ranked fourth most powerful country according to the Lowy Institute Asia Power Index. However, India’s overall score went down by two points from 2020, standing at 37.7 out of 100. It fell short of the major power threshold and is among the 18 countries which showed a downward trend in overall scores in 2021.

Lowy Institute is an independent think tank that releases the Asia Power Index by assessing the resources and influence to rank the relative power of states in the Indo-Pacific region. Lowy Institute has been releasing this index every year since 2018.

According to Lowy’s report, India performs best in future resources measures and stands behind the US and China. However, it lost growth potential largely due to “the impact of the coronavirus pandemic has led to a diminished economic forecast for 2030.”

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India stands at the fourth position in other measures like economic capability, military capability, resilience, and cultural influence.

“India is trending in opposite directions for its two weakest measures of power. On the one hand, it remains in 7th place in its defence networks, reflecting progress in its regional defence diplomacy — notably with the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, which includes Australia, Japan, and the United States,” said the report.

However, it lags in economic relationships standing at eighth position. “India has slipped into 8th position for economic relationships, as it falls further behind in regional trade integration efforts,” it added.

As per the report, India exerts less influence than expected in the region due to its negative power gap score. 

As India and Japan, are lagging behind, Asia is becoming more and more ‘bipolar’ as the US and China continue to hold more power in the region.

A reason for the same can be seen as the dependency of the competing countries like Australia and Japan on America.

“The [Indo-Pacific] region has become more bipolar and less multipolar: Japan and India are lagging behind China, and Australia is more reliant on the United States,” the report says. The US scored 82.2 and China scored 74.6. 

Here Is A List Of Top 10 Countries 

1. United States of America
2. China
3. Japan
4. India
5. Russia
6. Australia
7. South Korea
8. Singapore
9. Indonesia
10. Thailand