President Emmanuel Macron may not be riding high at home in France, but in Delhi, he draws immense political affection. Macron has carved out a distinctive place for Paris in Delhi’s strategic calculus. His visit to Mumbai and Delhi this week — his fourth to India since assuming office in 2017 — consolidates the significant transformation in bilateral ties in technology and defence, as well as the Indo-Pacific, over the last decade.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s sustained engagement with Macron has been part of India’s broader pivot to Europe in recent years. The visit of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in January, the presence of the European Union leadership at this year’s Republic Day celebrations, and the signing of the long-negotiated free trade agreement underline the growing salience of Europe in India’s strategic thinking.

This column has long been sceptical of “multipolarity” as an accurate description of the global balance of power. The US remains pre-eminent, and China has been steadily catching up. A number of other nations — including India and France — are some distance away in terms of economic scale, military weight, and technological depth.

If there is any doubt, one need only look at the AI Impact Summit in Delhi this week. The business of artificial intelligence continues to be dominated by American technology giants, and Washington is likely to exert considerable influence over the outcomes of the summit. China is the other AI superpower. Yet, the political and market conditions for substantive India-China cooperation in this domain are limited for now. There is, however, considerable scope for India to work with Europe and the middle powers in the non-Western world.

The popular phrase in Delhi — the........

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