Indian Ambassador to Oman Amit Narang has termed Oman a 'close friend' of India and ties are 'firing on all cylinders'. Speaking to WION's Sidhant Sibal in Muscat, Ambassador Amit Narang said, 'Oman is India's closest maritime neighbour. It takes less time to fly from Mumbai to Muscat than Mumbai to Delhi.

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Formal diplomatic relations were established in 1955. Since then, the relationship has been upgraded to a strategic partnership.

Comments come ahead of the key Indian Ocean Conference in the country in which several foreign ministers including EAM Dr S Jaishankar will participate. 

Oman will be hosting the 8th edition of the Indian Ocean Conference from February 16th to 17th. The conference is being organised by India Foundation in association with Oman's foreign ministry with the theme being "Voyages to New Horizons of Maritime Partnership". Full interview:

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Sidhant Sibal: What has been the focus of this year's Indian Ocean Conference?

Amit Narang: Yes, the eighth Indian Ocean conference is being held, is being hosted here in Oman. As you are aware, the Indian Ocean conference is one of India's flagship maritime events hosted by the India foundation in association with the Ministry of External Affairs. This year, it is being hosted by the Foreign Ministry of the Sultanate of Oman and Dr S Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister will be here to participate in the conference and deliver a keynote address at the inaugural session. Based on my understanding, there are ministers or senior officials from at least 30 countries who are participating. So, it's a large event, getting together all the countries who have a shared interest in the management of the Indian Ocean and the shared spaces. Now, as you are aware, the maritime cooperation, or the cooperation pertaining to the oceanic spaces has been increasingly salient in international relations discussions and dialogs, whether it is your national security or international trade and commerce or even global sustainability, the oceans play a central role. And given the fact that Indian Ocean, you know, the sits around, or rather, has so many countries and continents around the Indian Ocean. You know, it's a very important facet of international dialog today, the trademark of this conference is to bring together all the relevant stakeholders, decision makers and senior officials, to foster dialogue and cooperation on the Indian Ocean and all the issues surrounding it.

Sidhant Sibal: How do you see India, Oman relationship?

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Amit Narang: Oman is one of India's closest neighbours. In fact, a maritime neighbour, and the oceanic spaces on the map sometimes hide the fact how close they are to us. To just to give you a perspective, it takes less time to fly from Mumbai to Muscat than it takes to fly from Mumbai to Delhi. That's how close they are to us, and they have always been in the history, a very close maritime partner with the history between the people of India and the people of Oman go back at least 5000 years, and across this time, we have been trading with each other. So, it's a relationship which is based on trade, exchange of goods and ideas and cultures, and it's a remarkable history. And today, this old friendship stands transformed into a strategic partnership. And I must say, over the past few years, especially in the post pandemic phase, that relationship has truly come of age. And today, Oman is playing a very important role for us in this region, a close friend, a close partner, whether it comes to strategic cooperation, defense cooperation, international trade, or issues of people to people. Ties today, the relationship, India Oman relationship, I can say, is truly firing on all cylinders. Last few years have been some notable achievements under our presidency of the G20 you are aware, the Sultan of Oman was our special guest, a guest country. And the participation of the Omani side was very robust, very remarkable. More than 11 ministers participated, and the Omani delegation, they participated in more than 100 meetings all across India. That event really brought the countries together. Then in December 2023 the ruler of Oman, His Majesty Sultan Haitham bin Tariq, paid a state visit to India. This was the first state visit from Oman in more than 26 years. And the discussions with honourable Prime Minister Narendra Modi ji were very, very positive, very forward looking, very comprehensive. And both the leaders adopted the India Oman joint vision document, which is now going to be the roadmap for the future.

Sidhant Sibal: So my final question this relationship, which has a strong base, that is the People to People relationship. Many Indians stay here, for them Oman is a home. If you can shed light on this relationship?

Amit Narang: In fact, the Indian diaspora truly is the highlight of the India Oman relationship. And like you said, you know people, Indians from different parts of India have been coming , visiting and staying in Oman for at least a few 1000 years. We have evidence of that. In the more recent times, there is a part of the Indian community. I mean, there are about seven lakh Indians who are currently resident in Oman, but out of those seven lakhs, there is a small portion of Indians, merchant traders, predominantly from the state of Gujarat, who have been living in this country for between 200 to 300 years. This is recorded history, and today these families are into their sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, even 10th generations and living continuously in Oman. Some of them have become Omani citizens, but they maintain links with India, they maintain their culture, they maintain their traditions, and they're living harmoniously here and contributing to the Omani society. To bring this history back has been an attempt, Government of India, as you are aware, under Prime Minister Modi, prioritizes its relationship with his diaspora, celebrates the diaspora for its achievements in line with that in Oman we made an effort to bring back this history to the people. We did a whole long lecture series running over eight months where we got academics and the people to talk about this history and this remarkable history and the heritage is now being published as part of a book which will be released very soon. Apart from that, we also realized here that this community, by virtue of being living here, they are the custodians of very important documents, photographs, you know, little pieces of evidence which give you great snippets of history on how things were in the olden times. So an attempt has been made to preserve, and I'm very happy to report that for the first time, actually, the entire documentary heritage of the diaspora has now been digitized. This is I'm talking about Oman, has been digitized as part of the portal of the National Archives of India, where a separate portal today has preserved all their documents for future generations. This documentary heritage, diaspora heritage, was presented at an exhibition and in the recently concluded Pravasi Bharatiya Diwas in Bhubaneswar as well. So diaspora relationship with Oman is very important, and that is something that we are also working to bring it back to the public limelight.