By Skipping ASEAN Summit, Modi Weakens India’s ‘Act East’ Outreach

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s decision to “virtually” attend the 22nd ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur has drawn criticism at home. ASEAN and East Asia summits are among the region’s most significant diplomatic gatherings, attended by top leaders from the Indo-Pacific and BRICS. This year’s meetings saw the presence of leaders from the U.S., China, Japan, Australia, and Brazil – but India’s prime minister chose to stay away.

Some have attributed Modi’s absence to a desire to avoid a potentially awkward meeting with Donald Trump; others suggest he was more focused on the Bihar elections. Host Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim of Malaysia said Modi’s absence was due to Diwali festivities in India – a reason that struck many as trivial, given the event’s geopolitical importance.

In his virtual address, Modi reaffirmed support for ASEAN centrality and Indo-Pacific cooperation, declaring that the 21st century would be “the century of India and ASEAN” and announcing 2026 as the “Year of India-ASEAN Maritime Cooperation.” But lofty words over video could not compensate for the optics of his absence. It undercut India’s effort to project itself as a pillar of stability and a counterweight to China.

Unlike China, Japan, or the US, India directly borders several ASEAN states – Myanmar by land, and Thailand and Indonesia across maritime boundaries. Modi’s absence, therefore, carried a sharper diplomatic edge. It also marked a break from his earlier record. During his first term, Modi personally attended all East Asia Summits held alongside ASEAN gatherings and participated virtually during the pandemic years. He missed the 2022 summit but attended those in 2023 and 2024.

While virtual participation avoided awkward encounters – particularly with Trump – it risked signaling disengagement at a time when Southeast Asia is central to India’s economic diversification and security strategy. In-person summits provide vital opportunities for informal diplomacy: side meetings, corridor discussions, and rapport-building. The revival of the Quad in 2017, for example, happened on the sidelines of an ASEAN summit. By staying away, Modi forfeited those avenues of influence.

His absence was conspicuous against the backdrop of strong in-person participation by global leaders. U.S. President Donald Trump, Japan’s Sanae Takaichi, Canada’s Mark Carney, Australia’s Anthony Albanese, China’s Li Qiang, and Brazil’s Lula were all present, using the event to advance national interests and deepen partnerships. Amid U.S.–India trade frictions and China’s assertive regional diplomacy, India’s absence allowed other powers to shape ASEAN’s outlook on stability, trade, and growth.

External affairs minister S. Jaishankar and defence minister Rajnath Singh did attend related meetings – the latter even signed an extension of the India-U.S. Defence Framework Agreement with his American counterpart, Pete Hegseth. Yet ministerial representation could not substitute for the gravitas of prime-ministerial diplomacy.

Modi’s presence would have been particularly significant for rebuilding ties with Malaysia. Relations have been strained in recent years over Zakir Naik’s presence in Kuala Lumpur and Malaysian criticism of the Citizenship Amendment Act and the revocation of Jammu and Kashmir’s special status. Since Anwar Ibrahim took office in 2022, ties have been improving; he visited India last year, and the Kuala Lumpur summit offered a valuable opportunity to consolidate that momentum.

The ASEAN-India Summit itself covered important agenda items, notably the ongoing review of the ASEAN-India Trade in Goods Agreement (AITIGA), a 2010 free trade pact now being renegotiated at India’s request. Modi’s absence limited India’s ability to drive these discussions and weakened the optics of New Delhi’s ambition to raise bilateral trade to $200 billion.

ASEAN’s economic weight makes the absence even more consequential. The 11-member bloc is projected to become the world’s fourth-largest economy by 2030. Recognising this, both the U.S. and China went all-in on diplomatic theatre. To court Trump, Malaysia rolled out the red carpet, including a fighter-jet escort and lavish praise for his role in brokering a peace deal between Thailand and Cambodia. Within hours of his arrival, Washington and ASEAN signed several trade agreements, including one on critical minerals – a sector where Malaysia, with its rich rare-earth reserves, already supplies 13% of global demand.

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Trump’s visit also helped the U.S. repair its image in the region, tarnished by steep “Liberation Day” tariffs and cuts to USAID. Following his visit, several ASEAN members secured tariff reductions and product-specific exemptions, signalling Washington’s renewed economic engagement.

Not to be outdone, China capitalised on the moment. Beijing and ASEAN signed an upgraded free trade pact, improving market access in agriculture, the digital economy, and pharmaceuticals. ASEAN has been China’s largest trading partner since 2009, with bilateral trade reaching $771 billion last year. China is also a top investor in the region, especially in nickel and electric-vehicle batteries, and continues to deepen connectivity through the Belt and Road Initiative. Both ASEAN and China are members of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), the world’s largest trading bloc, whose first summit Malaysia also hosted this October.

India, notably, opted out of RCEP – a decision defended on domestic economic grounds but one that increasingly looks like strategic self-exclusion. With both Washington and Beijing intensifying their courtship of ASEAN, New Delhi risks being left on the sidelines of the region’s most consequential economic and geopolitical shifts.

Modi has invested considerable political capital in shaping India’s global posture – strengthening ties with Gulf states and Israel, cultivating influence in the Global South, and pushing for India’s leadership in multilateral forums. Yet the absence in Kuala Lumpur sent the opposite signal. Coming at a time when the Indo-Pacific is being re-ordered by renewed great-power competition, it suggested drift in India’s “Act East” policy – a weakening of the very initiative that sought to turn outreach into action.

In-person diplomacy is often about presence as much as policy. Symbolism counts, and ASEAN’s leaders are acutely aware of who shows up. Modi’s choice to appear only on screen, ostensibly for Diwali celebrations, risked diminishing India’s credibility as a committed regional partner. Even if his virtual remarks reiterated familiar talking points – shared prosperity, maritime cooperation, and a “free and open Indo-Pacific” – the absence of face-to-face engagement made India seem distant, even distracted.

Clearly, much is shifting in Southeast Asia, and India seems to be missing in action. Having already opted out of RCEP and now staying away from a major ASEAN summit, New Delhi is ceding diplomatic space at a crucial moment. With the U.S. and China doubling down on the region, the message from Kuala Lumpur was unmistakable: the geopolitics of India’s own neighbourhood are being reshaped – and New Delhi is watching from afar.

Manoj Joshi is a distinguished fellow, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi.

This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire – and has been updated and republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.

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