India, Burundi and Africa: The Quiet Rise of a Global South Partnership

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The presence of the African Union Chairperson fitted naturally into this wider diplomatic landscape. Africa has become fairly important to debates over global governance, development finance and South-South cooperation. India’s engagement with the AU during its BRICS chairmanship therefore reinforced a broader effort to connect BRICS diplomacy with the concerns of developing countries.

The Modi–Ndayishimiye meeting may have been brief, but the geography behind it was enormous. Inside the polished halls of Bharat Mandapam, India’s Africa story found another chapter when Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Évariste Ndayishimiye, President of Burundi and Chairperson of the African Union, on the sidelines of the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi. The conversation carried significance well beyond a bilateral exchange. It brought together India’s expanding relationship with Africa and its larger attempt to give the Global South greater weight in a changing international order.

President Ndayishimiye was in New Delhi as the representative of the African Union, which now brings together 55 member states. That alone gives the encounter a scale that cannot be captured by the size of Burundi’s economy or the relatively modest volume of India-Burundi trade. A conversation with the AU Chairperson is effectively a conversation with a continental institution whose political and economic importance is steadily rising.

From a Bilateral Meeting to a Continental Conversation

The most important thread running through the meeting was the India-African Union partnership. Modi and Ndayishimiye recalled India’s role in bringing the African Union into the G20 during India’s presidency in 2023, a diplomatic move that carried significance far beyond symbolism.

For decades, Africa’s voice in global institutions has often been weaker than its demographic and geographic weight would suggest. India’s effort to change that equation was therefore consequential. It also reflected a broader Indian view that developing countries require greater representation in institutions that shape the rules of the global economy.

That logic now extends naturally into India’s engagement with the African Union. The discussion around the early convening of the 4th India-Africa Forum Summit could become particularly important. The previous summit in 2015 brought representatives from all 54 African countries with which India then had diplomatic relations. The jump was striking. Participation had expanded from 17 African countries at the first two editions to the entire continent at IAFS-III.

A decade later, IAFS-IV carries a different expectation. It must show whether political momentum can be converted into deeper partnerships that survive beyond summit photographs. The need for such an institutional push is clear. India’s relationship with Africa has grown through individual bilateral partnerships, development assistance and political engagement, but the continental relationship requires its own architecture. A renewed forum could provide precisely that space.

Where Diplomacy Meets the Daily Reality of Development

The Burundi component of the meeting was equally revealing because it showed what India’s Africa policy looks like away from the grand language of geopolitics.

The two leaders reviewed cooperation spanning development, capacity building, agriculture, healthcare and economic engagement. Modi also highlighted youth skilling and clean energy in his message following the meeting. These are areas where diplomatic statements can acquire meaning only when they eventually reach people beyond government offices.

For a farmer, development diplomacy is not measured in communiqués. It is measured in productivity, income and security. This distinction matters in Africa, where agricultural productivity remains closely connected to food security and rural livelihoods. India’s own experience with agricultural transformation gives it a body of practical knowledge that can be adapted to African conditions. The same applies to skills development. A young and expanding workforce can become an economic advantage only when education and employable skills move together.

Clean energy adds another dimension. African economies face rising energy requirements while also confronting the financial and environmental constraints associated with conventional energy systems. Affordable technologies, local capacity and decentralised solutions could therefore become an important part of India’s future development partnership with the continent.

The commercial relationship with Burundi, however, also reveals the distance still left to travel. Bilateral trade stood at only USD 30.59 million in 2024–25, with Indian exports accounting for USD 29.37 million. The figure is modest, but its real significance lies elsewhere. It shows that the political warmth between the two countries has yet to produce anything close to the commercial depth their relationship could potentially support.

A Vaccine Shipment Can Say More Than a Diplomatic Speech

Healthcare offered perhaps the clearest example of what practical South-South cooperation can look like. During the COVID-19 crisis, India sent more than 25 million vaccine doses to African countries under its Vaccine Maitri initiative. Pharmaceutical capacity was turned into an instrument of diplomacy, but the significance of that assistance went beyond diplomatic goodwill. In a crisis measured in lives and hospital beds, the value of cooperation was immediately tangible.

That experience provides useful context for the healthcare discussion between Modi and Ndayishimiye. Modi commended the African Union leadership for combating the Ebola outbreak, while Ndayishimiye appreciated India’s medical support to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

The episode points towards a more practical understanding of tactical partnership. Health security has become inseparable from national and continental resilience. African institutions need stronger capacity to respond to outbreaks, while India possesses pharmaceutical and medical capabilities that can contribute to that effort.

The relationship becomes more credible when assistance strengthens institutions rather than merely producing favourable headlines. For the African Union, partnerships with India can provide access to expertise and affordable solutions. For India, such cooperation creates deeper links with African institutions while reinforcing a model of diplomacy built around capability and shared developmental interests. This is a more durable foundation than diplomatic rhetoric alone.

BRICS Was the Setting, but Africa Was Part of the Larger Strategy

The timing of the meeting also matters. India hosted the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi under the theme “Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability.” The summit brought together BRICS members, partner countries and wider outreach participants, giving New Delhi a platform that extended well beyond the formal boundaries of the grouping.

During the summit, Modi held as many as 15 sit-down bilateral meetings with visiting heads of state and government, alongside pull-aside conversations with other leaders and heads of international institutions.

Diplomatic calendars can sometimes look like administrative paperwork. This one carried a vital message. India was using the BRICS platform to engage beyond the core grouping and deepen relationships across the Global South. The meeting with Burundi’s president therefore belonged to a much larger diplomatic design.

The Real Test Begins After the Handshake

There is, however, a danger in reading every high-level India-Africa meeting as evidence of an already consolidated partnership. Political goodwill matters, but institutions matter more. Announcements matter, but implementation determines whether they acquire staying power. India has already demonstrated the breadth of its development diplomacy in Africa. It has extended Lines of Credit to 42 African countries, giving the relationship a material dimension that goes far beyond ceremonial engagement.

The next phase requires sharper attention to outcomes. The proposed India-Africa Forum Summit can become an opportunity to assess what has worked, identify where implementation has lagged and establish partnerships capable of producing measurable economic value. India-Burundi ties, meanwhile, could benefit from moving beyond a largely development-oriented relationship towards greater commercial engagement.

This requires patience. Africa is not a single market, and India cannot approach the continent through one template. Burundi’s requirements are different from those of Nigeria or South Africa. Continental ambitions must therefore be supported by country-specific partnerships that understand local priorities.

There is also a larger geopolitical reason for India to stay invested. The Global South is becoming rather assertive about its place in international decision-making. African states possess growing diplomatic importance, natural resources, expanding consumer markets and considerable influence within multilateral institutions. India’s relationship with Africa consequently has implications for its own ability to shape debates on global governance.

Yet the strongest partnerships will be those that African countries themselves see as useful. This is why the most persuasive story emerging from the Modi-Ndayishimiye meeting is not about grand alignment. It is about whether political trust can produce practical capability.

The promise of South-South cooperation becomes credible only when ordinary citizens can feel its dividends. For India, that means treating Africa as a long-term partner whose importance extends beyond summit diplomacy. For Burundi and the African Union, it means converting engagement with India into projects that strengthen economic resilience, institutional capacity and human development.

The handshake at Bharat Mandapam was therefore only the visible part of a much larger relationship. The harder work lies beyond the photographs. It lies in the farmer whose harvest improves, the young worker who gains a marketable skill, the patient who receives treatment and the community that gains access to reliable energy. If India can connect its diplomatic ambition with those everyday outcomes, its Africa partnership will acquire something that communiqués cannot manufacture: staying power.

In a world organised around competing geopolitical blocs, India’s engagement with Burundi and the African Union offers a different kind of proposition. Its real strength will come when development cooperation becomes the infrastructure of diplomacy, giving the Global South greater agency not merely around conference tables, but in the lives of the people those tables are meant to serve.