'Volatile Trump may misinterpret it': Ex-diplomat on whether BRICS is becoming anti-West

India is unlikely to allow BRICS to turn into an anti-Western bloc, but a "very volatile" Donald Trump could still misinterpret the grouping, former Indian High Commissioner Ajay Bisaria said on Thursday.

Bisaria said India's approach was driven by its strategic interests in the West and its policy of strategic autonomy.

"I think there were some instincts within BRICS in the past, which tried to push it towards an anti-West kind of positioning. That doesn't suit India. And India doesn't push it in that direction. On the contrary, India balances it a little more," Bisaria said while speaking at the India Today BRICS Roundtable.

"What India has been doing successfully is changing the branding to a non-Western grouping rather than an anti-Western grouping," he said.

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The former diplomat said Western governments should see India's role in BRICS as a stabilising factor rather than a threat.

"If I were sitting as an adviser to Trump today or in Brussels, I would tell the leaders that you're lucky that you have India guiding this process," he said. "Because India ensures none of these groups become anti-West because India has substantial equities in the West."

He said the bigger concern was not BRICS itself adopting a strong anti-West position, but the possibility that the grouping could be interpreted that way in Washington.

"So I would say this is not a huge risk of a very strong anti-West message coming out of this BRICS. But the small danger is of the US misinterpreting it that way because of a very volatile White House and a very volatile Trump," he said.

The former high commissioner said India was unlikely to take a defensive position on the issue. "India on this is not going to be batting on the back foot. India is going to be on the front foot on strategic autonomy and defending the BRICS," he said. "But there's always this small danger of it being misinterpreted."

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A World Of 'Multiple Promiscuous Alliances'

When asked why Trump engages with Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin but objects when India does the same, Bisaria pointed to what he called the "whimsical nature" of the US President. He said there was growing engagement between the US, China, and Russia, including over the Ukraine war and an upcoming AI summit, with talk of a possible G3 meeting in November involving Trump, Xi, and Putin in China.

India, he said, should respond by pointing to its own partnerships with China and Russia. "I think our response should be, oh, here's the G3 as well, which is China, Russia, and India. This is a world of multiple promiscuous alliances. Please don't mind it," Bisaria said.