Nepal, March 3 -- With a touch of nip still in the air, New Delhi had just about the perfect weather to welcome over 3,000 delegates to the three-day Raisina Dialogue (February 21-23). Another couple of weeks, and the Taj Palace Hotel lawns could have been boiling hot.

Hosted by the Observer Research Foundation in partnership with the Ministry of External Affairs, "India's premier conference on geopolitics and geoeconomics" has come to symbolise the country's rising global clout and the soaring ambitions of its leaders.

Currently growing at 7.5 percent, India under Modi is increasingly confident of its place in the world. Gone are the days when Westerners could lecture it on human rights and its leaders would feign to listen while seeth...