Discuss the five proposals made by India in the recent COP-26 conference held in Glasgow. (150 words) (2021, 10 Marks)
At COP-26 in Glasgow (November 2021), Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the Panchamrit, five “nectar elements” of India’s climate action. They moved India from a defensive posture built on common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR) to one that pairs equity claims with ambitious national targets.
The five commitments
- 500 GW non-fossil capacity by 2030: about two-thirds of projected installed capacity, against the 40% share pledged in the 2015 NDC.
- Half of energy needs from renewables by 2030: read mainly as electricity; it demands large investment in storage and transmission.
- A one-billion-tonne cut in projected emissions by 2030: India’s first commitment framed in absolute tonnes, measured against a business-as-usual path rather than as a cap.
- A 45% cut in emissions intensity of GDP by 2030 against 2005, up from 33–35%, a step analysts reckon is itself worth about a billion tonnes.
- Net zero by 2070: two decades after most developed economies. It left open whether it covers carbon dioxide alone, which sends a long-term signal compatible with the 2°C goal, or all greenhouse gases, which would exceed a fair Indian share.
Significance and limits
- Climate justice. The pledges came with a demand that developed countries provide US$1 trillion in climate finance, echoing Anil Agarwal and Sunita Narain’s Global Warming in an Unequal World (1991) on historical responsibility. India also launched Mission LiFE, co-launched with the UK the Green Grids Initiative–One Sun One World One Grid, and pressed, with China, for the coal “phase-down” wording in the Glasgow Climate Pact.
- Formalisation was partial. The August 2022 updated NDC carried only two of the five, the 45% intensity cut and 50% non-fossil installed capacity, which recast “energy requirements” as power capacity. Net zero by 2070 went into India’s long-term low-emission strategy.
- Delivery has outpaced the pledge. Non-fossil sources crossed half of installed capacity in June 2025, five years early, and stood at 52.57% in February 2026. The NDC for 2031–35, approved on 25 March 2026, raises the intensity cut to 47% and the non-fossil share to 60% by 2035; intensity had already fallen 36% between 2005 and 2020.
- Critics note that a capacity share is not a generation share, since coal still dominates generation, and that a 2070 date leaves a long tail of emissions.
Conclusion
The Panchamrit showed India as a norm-shaper, not only a veto player: it defended equity while accepting that ambition is now the price of legitimacy. Its credibility rests on finance and technology access, which the North has not delivered, least of all since the US exit from the Paris Agreement took effect in January 2026.