♤ In addition, India may also have to either dilute its growing partnership with the West or engage in a delicate balancing act.

♤ Except India, all the other members of SCO have endorsed China’s BRI initiative. India’s primary concern is related to the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Infact, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan had long crossed India’s sovereignty red lines when they signed the Quadrilateral Traffic in Transit Agreement (QTTA) with Pakistan in 1995 to use the Karakoram Highway (KKH) passing through Gilgit-Baltistan as a transit corridor.

♤ Given the state of relations between India and Pakistan, many assume that the spotlight would shift away from Central Asia towards tensions in South Asia, thus making regional cooperation hard to foster.

♤ With regards to RATS, India might face difficulties as the Indian understanding of terrorism is different from the other members of SCO. Whereas for India it is related to state sponsored cross border terrorism. SCO’s targets are groups like East-Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) and Al-Qaeda, whereas groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaiesh-e- Mohammad, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, Afghan Taliban and Haqqani Network do not come under the ambit of the SCO anti-terror structure