India, Dec. 6 -- India and Russia made the much-needed move of putting their economic relationship front and centre at their annual summit, drawing up a five-year programme for developing strategic areas in this sphere, concluding a mobility agreement and reiterating their commitment to the energy partnership that has been under stress because of pressure from the West. In many ways, the summit between PM Narendra Modi and President Vladimir Putin was an opportunity for India to reassert its stance of strategic autonomy amid unprecedented churn and uncertainty on the international stage. The outcomes of the summit were, in some ways, a riposte to strident calls from the West to curtail economic ties with Russia. Modi's act of breaking with protocol to receive Putin at the airport set the tone for the India-Russia Summit, reinforcing the importance attached by New Delhi to one of its most consequential strategic partnerships. The optics of the visit - though Putin is visiting India for the tenth time, it is his first since the start of the invasion of Ukraine in 2022 - were meant to restate that India's legacy ties with Russia are very much intact and to reaffirm the doctrine of strategic autonomy that places national interest at the heart of diplomatic choices. The pageantry and hospitality were meant to impress Moscow about New Delhi's commitment to bilateral ties, but could also be seen as a message to the US, which imposed punishing tariffs on Indian goods over Russian oil purchases, that India still has options. This was in line with the narrative generated by the images of Modi and Putin in the company of Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit some months ago. The Modi-Putin bonhomie, with Western capitals watching, merits description as a key geopolitical moment, when old global power equations are unravelling, and the contours of a multipolar world are emerging. The decision by India and Russia to focus on their economic partnership at the summit and a subsequent business forum, which too was joined by Modi and Putin, reflected the realisation by both sides that they can no longer depend solely on their long-standing defence and strategic ties to take their overall relations into the future. The "Programme for the Development of Strategic Areas of India-Russia Economic Cooperation till 2030" is meant to ensure that two-way trade and investment become more diversified and balanced, a necessary step at a time when trade is completely skewed in Russia's favour. This, coupled with the renewed commitment to finalising a free trade agreement between India and the Eurasian Economic Union, could go a long way in addressing India's concerns about the lack of access to Russian markets and non-tariff barriers. The future is surely not G2, as US President Donald Trump framed it, but multiple powers pursuing their national goals while cooperating on mutually beneficial interests. Putin has unambiguously backed New Delhi's stance on terrorism and promised uninterrupted shipments of fuel to India. Both Putin and Modi were confident of expanding bilateral trade to $100 billion by 2030, up from $68 billion now. India-Russia ties have never looked so good since the heady days of the Indo-Soviet Friendship Treaty signed at the height of the Cold War in 1971. However, unlike then, India now has the economic heft, strategic confidence and diplomatic leverage to pursue close relations with Russia, the US and Europe in parallel. As it should....