(Image source from: India misses elite gathering G20 on women and youth})

India has not represented itself in an elite gathering G20 on women and youth for failing to provide names of delegates to champion the national cause, while Women20 and Youth20 include members from all G20’s 20 countries. India's size and place compared to other countries makes its absence noticeable.
 
Launched on Sunday by Turkish Prime Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, W20 emphasizes on the burning issues of employment and empowerment in their meetings. Along with host Turkey, delegates belonging to big economies like the US, Germany, France, Australia and others have participated in the event.

Niche advocacy hubs were engagement groups, which include Thinktank20, Civil Society20, Labour20 and others to add-on the goal of "inclusiveness" in economic growth. As the G20’s priority, three ‘I’s were included by the Turkey presidency of G20. They are Implementation, Inclusiveness and Infrastructure.

Hakan Bingol, Y20 vice-chair, said the Y20 co-ordinates with national government accredited youth bodies. The respective foreign ministries have forwarded the names. He expected the participation from India in Y20 soon.

India’s absence was disappointing

India’s absence at Ankara was disappointing as few of the major concerns of India are backwardness and women's independence at the same time the south Asian country has the largest young population. India's absence was blamed by the officials in the host camp as the failure of the government towards finalizing the names.

The officials who said that the failure to send the names of delegates reflect the reluctance of India. However, they also opined that the Government probably could not pick three persons from the crowd of contenders willing to be a part of W20 and Y20.

W20 president Dr Gulden Turktan told TOI that, "W20 wrote to India in June for three names but there has been no response."

Expressing hope, Turktan said India would revert soon as the reports would be finalized by the engagement groups. In November, these reports would be factored in by the G20 in its heads of government summit scheduled to take place in Antalya.

 

-Sumana