India-Africa relations are among the oldest and most layered partnerships in the world, stretching from monsoon-driven trading voyages across the Indian Ocean to today’s summits, credit lines and shared diplomatic causes. Africa is a continent of 54 countries, with a fast-growing young population, vast natural resources and rising weight in global forums, and it sits at the centre of India’s vision of the Global South.
What makes the relationship distinctive is that it was built on shared experience rather than on power. Both sides lived under colonial rule, both fought for dignity and self-determination, and both still argue for a fairer international order. This article explains how that bond grew, how it works today, how it compares with China’s footprint, and why Africa matters so much for India’s economic and strategic future.
Quick Facts
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Number of African countries | 54 sovereign countries, forming the African Union with a shared continental vision (Agenda 2063) |
| Oldest links | Indian Ocean monsoon trade between the Indian coast and East Africa, documented for well over two thousand years |
| Gandhi in South Africa | 1893 to 1914, where he developed satyagraha |
| First anti-apartheid step | India raised the treatment of Indians in South Africa at the United Nations in 1946 and imposed trade sanctions |
| Flagship training programme | ITEC (Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation), launched in 1964 |
| India-Africa Forum Summits | 2008 (New Delhi), 2011 (Addis Ababa), 2015 (New Delhi) |
| Digital connectivity project | Pan-African e-Network, begun around 2009, for tele-education and tele-medicine |
| G20 milestone | African Union admitted as a permanent member of the G20 at the New Delhi Summit, September 2023 |
Ancient Ties and the Indian Diaspora
Long before modern states existed, the Indian Ocean worked as a vast trading highway. Sailors used the seasonal monsoon winds, which blow towards Africa in one half of the year and back towards India in the other, to travel between the two coasts. Ancient Greco-Roman sailing guides such as the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea describe ports on the Indian and East African coasts connected by regular trade.
What was traded
- Cotton textiles, beads, spices and grain moving from Gujarat, Kutch and the Malabar coast to Africa.
- Ivory, gold, timber and other goods moving from the Swahili coast and the Horn of Africa to India.
- Shipbuilding knowledge and navigation skills that were shared across the ocean.
Cultural exchange
The Swahili language and culture of the East African coast carry traces of this contact, and Indian merchant communities settled in ports such as Zanzibar, Mombasa and Mogadishu centuries before European colonial powers arrived. Communities of African origin, such as the Siddis of Gujarat, Karnataka and Maharashtra, likewise settled in India over many centuries. These early links created a sense of familiarity that later political solidarity would build upon.
The Colonial Era and the Diaspora
The modern Indian presence in Africa expanded greatly during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries under British colonial rule. Indians travelled to Africa in several roles, and their descendants are today an important living bridge between the two regions.
Indentured labour and railway workers
After slavery was abolished in the British Empire, Indian indentured labourers were sent to work on sugar plantations in places such as Mauritius, Natal in South Africa and Reunion. Mauritius began receiving indentured workers in 1834, and their descendants now form a large part of that island nation’s population. In East Africa, thousands of workers were brought to build the Uganda Railway linking Mombasa to Lake Victoria in the late 1890s.
Traders and professionals
Alongside labourers came merchants, clerks, artisans and later doctors, teachers and lawyers who set up businesses across East and Southern Africa. Over time the Indian-origin community, often called the Indian diaspora in Africa, grew to include many generations born on the continent.
- East Africa: sizeable communities in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and neighbouring countries, with an enduring role in commerce.
- South Africa: one of the largest Indian-origin populations outside Asia, concentrated in KwaZulu-Natal.
- Mauritius: a majority of the population has Indian ancestry, and Indian cultural traditions remain central to national life.
The diaspora’s history has not been uniformly smooth. In 1972 Uganda expelled its Asian population, a traumatic episode that scattered families across the world. Even so, the diaspora remains a source of cultural, economic and people-to-people ties today.
Gandhi, Anti-Apartheid and Non-Alignment
No discussion of India-Africa relations is complete without Mahatma Gandhi. He travelled to South Africa in 1893 as a young barrister to assist in a legal case, and stayed, with intervals, until 1914. His experience of racial discrimination, including being removed from a train compartment at Pietermaritzburg, shaped his political thinking.
A laboratory for non-violent resistance
- He founded the Natal Indian Congress in 1894 to defend the rights of Indians.
- He set up the Phoenix Settlement near Durban in 1904 and Tolstoy Farm near Johannesburg in 1910, experiments in communal living.
- From 1906 he led campaigns of satyagraha, or non-violent civil resistance, against discriminatory laws such as compulsory registration of Indians.
The methods he honed in South Africa were later applied in India’s own freedom struggle. In turn, Gandhi’s ideas influenced African leaders and movements, and the memory of those years is regarded as a shared inheritance. Gandhi is commemorated in South Africa, and many African leaders have cited non-violent resistance as an inspiration for their own campaigns.
Anti-Colonialism and Solidarity
After independence in 1947, India became one of the most vocal voices against colonialism in international forums. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s government argued that political freedom for Asia would be incomplete while African peoples remained under foreign rule, and India backed decolonisation at the United Nations.
Leading the anti-apartheid struggle
India was the first country to raise the issue of racial discrimination in South Africa at the United Nations, in 1946, and it cut trade and diplomatic ties with the white-minority government. India maintained a strong boycott for decades, supported the African National Congress and other liberation movements, and was a leading force behind the global campaign for sanctions. Apartheid ended in the early 1990s, and India restored full relations after the transition to democracy in 1994.
Bandung and non-alignment
At the Asian-African Conference at Bandung in 1955, India, together with Indonesia, Egypt and others, helped launch a movement of newly independent states. This led to the Non-Aligned Movement, formally founded in Belgrade in 1961, in which African and Asian states stayed outside Cold War blocs and pushed for development, peace and decolonisation. India also contributed troops and medical teams to UN peacekeeping in Africa, beginning with the Congo in the early 1960s, and has remained one of the largest contributors to UN missions on the continent since.
The India-Africa Forum Summits
For decades, India’s engagement with Africa was largely bilateral and uneven. A more structured, continent-wide approach emerged in the early 2000s, when India began viewing Africa as a strategic partner rather than only a historical friend. The centrepiece of this approach is the India-Africa Forum Summit (IAFS), a triennial platform designed to bring India and African leaders together.
| Summit | Year | Host city | Highlights |
|---|---|---|---|
| IAFS-I | 2008 | New Delhi | First summit; launched a framework for cooperation covering trade, capacity building and infrastructure; a group of African countries attended, mainly regional organisation members |
| IAFS-II | 2011 | Addis Ababa | First summit held in Africa; expanded lines of credit and institution-building commitments, including training institutes across the continent |
| IAFS-III | 2015 | New Delhi | Largest gathering to date, with all 54 African countries invited and a large number represented at the level of heads of state or government; stressed partnership, scholarships and capacity building |
The fourth summit was planned after 2015 but has been repeatedly postponed, in part because of global disruptions, though India and African partners have continued to engage through other channels, including bilateral visits, ministerial meetings and the African Union. Even without regular summits, the IAFS framework set the template for the modern partnership.
India’s Development Partnership Model
India describes its engagement with Africa as a development partnership rather than as aid or investment alone. The approach emphasises that African countries decide their own priorities, and India responds with the tools it has: training, technology, concessional finance and the experience of a fellow developing economy. Policymakers often summarise the philosophy as being demand-driven, consultative and free from political conditions.
The guiding principles
In an address to the Ugandan Parliament in 2018, India set out a set of guiding principles for engagement with Africa. They highlighted that Africa’s priorities would be at the heart of the relationship, that India would aim to develop local capacity and skills, that projects should be affordable and sustainable, and that cooperation should avoid undermining the financial health of partner countries.
Why capacity building matters
Instead of focusing on extracting minerals or raw materials, much of India’s cooperation concentrates on human resources. That means training civil servants, engineers, doctors, teachers, entrepreneurs and technicians, and helping to set up local institutions, so that benefits stay in the host country. Critics note that this approach delivers slower and less visible results than large infrastructure, but supporters argue it generates lasting goodwill and skills.
Lines of Credit, Grants and Infrastructure
A major pillar of the relationship is concessional finance. Through the Export-Import Bank of India, backed by the government, India has extended Lines of Credit (LoCs) to African governments, amounting to well over ten billion US dollars in total over the past two decades. These credits have supported projects across a wide range of sectors.
- Railways and transport: locomotives, rolling stock and rail line rehabilitation in several African countries.
- Power and energy: transmission lines, hydroelectric and solar plants, and rural electrification.
- Agriculture and water: irrigation schemes, tractors, farm machinery, and agro-processing units.
- Social infrastructure: hospitals, educational institutions, and drinking water projects.
- Industrial facilities: sugar mills, cement units, and small and medium industries.
Alongside loans, India provides grants for projects and humanitarian assistance, such as emergency food and medical supplies after disasters. Indian companies, including those in power, engineering, automobiles and telecoms, have used these credits to enter African markets, which helps both sides: African governments receive affordable infrastructure, and Indian firms gain exposure to the continent.
ITEC, Scholarships and Pan-African e-Network
Human development is arguably the most recognisable face of India’s engagement. African professionals visit India every year to learn, and many of them go on to hold senior jobs in their governments and businesses.
The ITEC programme
The Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) programme was launched in 1964 and offers short- and medium-term courses in areas such as information technology, public administration, agriculture, rural development, banking, entrepreneurship and renewable energy. Over the decades, thousands of African professionals have been trained in Indian institutions through ITEC and its sister programme for Commonwealth countries. India also provides scholarships for African students to pursue full degrees in Indian universities, and the numbers of African students in India have grown steadily.
The Pan-African e-Network
Launched around 2009, the Pan-African e-Network was an ambitious project to connect African countries with Indian institutions by satellite and fibre. It enabled tele-education, with African students taking courses from Indian universities, and tele-medicine, linking African hospitals to specialists in Indian hospitals for consultations and training. The project, later reworked into the e-VidyaBharti and e-ArogyaBharti initiatives, showed how digital technology could stretch limited resources, and it remains a template for India’s technology diplomacy.
Trade, Energy and Investment
Economic ties have expanded greatly since the early 2000s. Africa is now one of India’s significant trade partners, with two-way trade running to close to one hundred billion US dollars in recent years, though this fluctuates with commodity prices. Several African countries rank among India’s important trading partners.
What flows each way
- Exports from India to Africa: pharmaceuticals and generic medicines, automobiles and two-wheelers, machinery, refined petroleum products, textiles, rice and other foodstuffs, and information technology services.
- Imports to India from Africa: crude oil and natural gas, gold, coal, cashew and other agricultural products, and minerals such as phosphates and ores.
Energy and critical resources
West African producers such as Nigeria, and others across the continent, supply an important share of India’s crude oil imports, which makes Africa a significant element of India’s energy security. India is also looking at Africa’s reserves of minerals needed for batteries, electronics and the clean-energy transition. Indian companies have invested in sectors from telecoms and banking to pharmaceuticals, tea, and mining, and India has been one of the notable sources of foreign investment into the continent. Trade is also helped by the African Continental Free Trade Area, which aims to create a single market across the continent and could open further opportunities for Indian business.
Health Cooperation and Vaccine Maitri
India is often called the pharmacy of the developing world because of its low-cost generic medicines. This capacity has been central to cooperation with Africa for many years, beginning with affordable antiretroviral drugs used against HIV/AIDS, which made treatment far cheaper across the continent from the early 2000s.
Vaccine Maitri
During the COVID-19 pandemic, India launched its Vaccine Maitri (vaccine friendship) initiative in early 2021, supplying locally manufactured vaccines to dozens of countries, a large share of them in Africa. Vaccines were provided both as grants and through commercial contracts and the COVAX facility. The initiative, along with the supply of medicines and medical equipment, was widely discussed as an expression of India’s partnership approach.
Long-term health links
- Medical tourism, with African patients travelling to Indian hospitals for advanced treatment.
- Training for African doctors and nurses, and tele-medicine links.
- Support for local pharmaceutical production and for regulatory cooperation.
Africa on the Global Stage: G20 and UN Reform
India has consistently positioned itself as a voice for the Global South, and Africa is central to that role. This has taken concrete form in two areas in particular.
African Union and the G20
During India’s presidency of the G20 in 2023, India pushed for the African Union to be given permanent membership of the grouping, in the same way as the European Union. At the New Delhi Summit in September 2023, leaders agreed to admit the African Union as a full permanent member. This was seen as a landmark for Africa’s representation in global economic governance, since the continent had previously been represented in the G20 by only one country, South Africa. India also hosted the Voice of the Global South Summit in 2023 to bring developing-country concerns to the agenda.
UN Security Council reform
India and African countries share the view that the United Nations Security Council reflects the world of 1945 rather than today’s. Africa has no permanent representation there despite the continent’s size and the fact that many UN peacekeeping missions and agenda items concern it. India supports the continent’s call for fair representation, as set out in the African Union’s position known as the Ezulwini Consensus, and its own aspiration to become a permanent member sits alongside that call.
Solar Power, Agriculture and Small Business
Beyond headline projects, India and Africa cooperate in sectors where Indian experience in low-cost solutions is useful to African conditions.
The International Solar Alliance
Launched jointly by India and France at the Paris climate conference in 2015, the International Solar Alliance (ISA) brings together countries lying between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, which receive abundant sunlight. Many African countries are among its members, and ISA programmes support solar pumps, rooftop systems, mini-grids and financing for solar projects. The ISA is headquartered in Gurugram, India, and Africa is seen as one of its most important regions because millions of people there still lack reliable electricity.
Agriculture and enterprise
- Sharing agricultural technology, farm machinery, seeds and food-processing know-how.
- Supporting pulses cultivation in countries such as Mozambique, with long-term purchase arrangements for Indian consumption.
- Promoting small and medium enterprises through training institutes, incubators and entrepreneurship centres.
- Digital public infrastructure, such as payment systems and identity platforms, offered as models to African partners.
India and China in Africa
No analysis of the subject is complete without a look at China, whose economic footprint on the continent is much larger. China is Africa’s biggest single trading partner and a major lender and builder of ports, railways, roads and power plants, often through large-scale projects. Its engagement has been supported by high-level forums and substantial financial resources.
How India differs
| Dimension | India | China |
|---|---|---|
| Scale of finance | Smaller, concessional credit and grants | Much larger loans and project financing |
| Focus | Capacity building, training, technology, healthcare | Large infrastructure, ports, mining, manufacturing |
| Labour | Tends to emphasise local skills and local employment | Often uses contract workers brought from China |
| Image | Partnership based on shared colonial history and the diaspora | Economic powerhouse offering rapid delivery |
| Stated approach | Demand-driven, without political conditions | Non-interference, with commercial emphasis |
Indian officials describe the relationship as complementary rather than competitive, and many African governments value having multiple partners. India’s approach is to offer an alternative that stresses affordability, local ownership and transparency, while also cooperating with other partners such as Japan through initiatives like the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor.
Challenges and the Road Ahead
For all its promise, the partnership faces genuine difficulties, and analysts regularly point to the following.
- Implementation and delivery: projects financed by lines of credit have sometimes been delayed, due to procedural hurdles, funding gaps or limited capacity on either side. Faster delivery would strengthen credibility.
- The scale gap with China: India’s financial resources and private investment are smaller, so it must focus on areas where it adds distinctive value rather than competing project for project.
- Diversity across the continent: Africa is not a single market. Its 54 countries differ in size, income, politics, languages and regional blocs, so a continent-wide strategy needs to be adapted to each region, from North Africa to the Sahel and from the Horn to Southern Africa.
- Connectivity: direct flights, shipping routes and banking links between India and many African countries remain limited.
- Security and stability: conflict, piracy and terrorism in parts of Africa affect trade and investment, which is one reason India participates in maritime security and peacekeeping.
- Debt sustainability: like all lenders, India has to ensure that credits do not overburden partners with limited fiscal space.
Why Africa Matters for India’s Future
Africa’s importance to India will only grow in the decades ahead. By mid-century the continent is expected to have one of the largest working-age populations in the world and a large consumer market. Its resources, from energy to critical minerals, its agricultural potential and its sunlight make it important to India’s own energy and food security.
Strategically, the Indian Ocean links the two regions, so the security of sea lanes, ports and maritime trade is a shared concern. Politically, African countries make up the largest regional group in the United Nations General Assembly, and their support counts in debates on reform and global governance. Economically, India’s growing manufacturing, services and technology sectors need new markets, and Africa needs affordable products, skills and financing. The relationship is therefore best viewed as a mutually beneficial one in which both sides pursue growth, dignity and a larger voice in global affairs.
Conclusion
From the monsoon voyages of ancient traders and Gandhi’s years in South Africa to solidarity in the anti-apartheid struggle, and from the India-Africa Forum Summits to the African Union’s place at the G20 table, India-Africa relations have evolved from shared history into a broad modern partnership. India’s strengths lie in capacity building, health, technology and trust, rather than in the sheer scale of capital. Its challenge is to deliver consistently and to match words with results across a diverse continent. If it does, Africa will remain one of the most important pillars of India’s future in the world.
Frequently Asked Questions
How old are India-Africa relations?
Contacts between India and Africa go back well over two thousand years, to monsoon-driven trade across the Indian Ocean. Modern ties developed through the shared experience of colonial rule, the anti-apartheid movement and the Non-Aligned Movement, along with the settlement of Indian-origin communities in East and Southern Africa.
What are the India-Africa Forum Summits?
The India-Africa Forum Summit (IAFS) is a platform for leaders of India and African countries to set the direction of their partnership. Three summits have been held so far: in New Delhi in 2008, in Addis Ababa in 2011 and in New Delhi in 2015. The latest edition invited all 54 African countries.
What is the ITEC programme?
ITEC stands for Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation, a programme launched in 1964. It funds training courses in India for professionals from partner countries in fields such as information technology, public administration, agriculture and entrepreneurship. Thousands of African officials and professionals have benefited from it over the years.
How did India help Africa join the G20?
During its G20 presidency in 2023, India championed the cause of making the African Union a permanent member of the grouping, and it was formally admitted at the New Delhi Summit in September 2023. Before this, South Africa was the only African country in the G20.
How is India’s approach different from China’s?
India’s engagement is smaller in financial scale but focuses on capacity building, training, healthcare, technology and demand-driven projects with an emphasis on local skills. China provides much larger funding for big infrastructure and has a far bigger trade presence. Many African nations see value in working with both.
What was Vaccine Maitri?
Vaccine Maitri was an initiative launched in early 2021 under which India supplied COVID-19 vaccines made in India to many countries, including a large number in Africa. Supplies were delivered through grants, commercial arrangements and the global COVAX facility, and it highlighted India’s role as a major producer of affordable medicines.
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