The Centre for Social and Economic Progress (CSEP) hosted a seminar titled “Decoding India at Belém: Priorities at COP30” on Thursday, November 6, 2025.

The seminar featured a panel discussion between Constantino Xavier, Senior Fellow, CSEP, Pooja Ramamurthi, Fellow, CSEP and Veda Vaidyanathan, Fellow, CSEP. The discussion was moderated by Anindita Sinh, Research Associate, CSEP.

About the event

COP30 in Belém, arrives at a decisive moment for the climate crisis, even as countries in the Global North move away from their climate commitments. The agenda emphasises implementation while spotlighting the leadership of the Global South. India is poised to play a crucial role in shaping negotiations and pathways toward a more equitable climate action. The Centre for Social and Economic Progress (CSEP) hosted a discussion which aimed to bridge India’s overarching priorities at COP30, to generate key insights and advance strategic dialogue.

The session examined alternative paradigms for climate cooperation, such as triangular cooperation as a tool for collaboration, exploring whether and how such models can scale impact and deliver practical solutions. It also addressed how the Global South can build coalitions that shape climate negotiations around justice, ambition, and shared responsibility. A major focus was on critical minerals, ensuring that the transition to clean energy does not reinforce patterns of inequality in the Global South but instead prioritises fairness, sustainability, and long-term resilience. The final central theme was climate finance, spotlighting India’s role in advocating reforms at multilateral banks and COPs to reshape global priorities and mobilise resources based on the needs of the Global South.

By bringing these strands together, the event brought deep insights on what India’s strategic priorities will be at COP30, and how to strengthen them if it wins the bid to host COP33.

Panellists

Constantino Xavier

Constantino Xavier is a Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy and Security Studies at the Centre for Social and Economic Progress (CSEP) in New Delhi. At CSEP he leads the Sambandh Initiative on regional connectivity. He is also a non-resident fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, in Washington DC.

His research expertise is on India’s role as a regional power and the intersecting dimensions of security, connectivity and democracy across South Asia and the Indian Ocean. He also works on India’s relations with the European Union and other democratic powers in the Indo-Pacific, and has published widely in academic books and journals on India’s foreign and security policies with a focus on state capacity, regional institutions, economic and infrastructure diplomacy and soft power. He is writing a book on India’s democratic realism and involvement in the neighbourhood since the 1950s, based on declassified records and interviews with decision-makers in India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Myanmar.

He regularly teaches, lectures and supervises research on foreign policy and strategic affairs at international universities and also at India’s diplomatic, administrative and military training institutions, including the Sushma Swaraj Institute of Foreign Service Institute, the Naval War College and the National Defence College. He has held fellowships at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses and at the Observer Research Foundation, in New Delhi, and previously worked at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Brookings Institution. He received research grants from the United States Fulbright program and the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), Ministry of External Affairs, of which he is a Distinguished Alumni awardee.

Dr Xavier holds a Ph.D. in South Asian studies from the Johns Hopkins University, School of Advanced International Studies, an M.Phil. and M.A. in International Politics from Jawaharlal Nehru University, and a B.A. with undergraduate studies at Nova University Lisbon and Sciences Po Paris.

Pooja Vijay Ramamurthi 

Pooja Vijay Ramamurthi is a Fellow in CSEP. She has a PhD in Science, Technology and Environmental Policy at the School of Public and international Affairs (STEP) at Princeton University. She studies climate and energy transition policy, particularly focusing on the role that India can play in accelerating domestic and international action towards decarbonisation.

Her work has always been multidisciplinary, where she looks at techno-economic, social and political dimensions of sustainability. She has worked at premier think tanks in India, including the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago and the Center for Study of Science, Technology and Policy. She has also worked on projects in Ghana and Cambodia. Her work has resulted in her being invited to international level conferences and publications in peer reviewed journals and leading newspapers.

She is recipient of the Prize Fellowship for Social Sciences at Princeton University. She has also received her double Master’s degree in Sustainable Energy from the Royal institute of Technology, Sweden and Instituto Superior Tecnico, Portugal via the Innoenergy scholarship granted by the European Union.

Veda Vaidyanathan

Veda Vaidyanathan is a Fellow in Foreign Policy and Security Studies at CSEP. She examines Asian engagement in Africa from the grassroots, across multiple sectors and countries. These include financial services, mining, agriculture, infrastructure, and manufacturing in Zimbabwe, Zambia, Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Ghana. Veda is also affiliated to the Institute of Chinese Studies and the Harvard University Asia Centre. She was a 2022-23 Fung Global Fellow at the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies at Princeton University.

Moderator

Anindita Sinh

Anindita Sinh is a Research Associate in the Foreign Policy and Security Studies team, where she works on India’s minerals diplomacy and climate cooperation. She holds a Master’s degree in International Relations and Area Studies from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and a B.A. (Hons.) in Liberal Arts from Symbiosis International University, Pune.

She previously interned with CSEP and the United Service Institution of India.

In her free time, Anindita enjoys reading, long-distance running, art history, and trekking.

All content reflects the individual views of the speakers. The Centre for Social and Economic Progress (CSEP) does not hold an institutional view on any subject.

Please contact Gurmeet Kaur at GKaur@csep.org for general queries and Ayesha Manocha at AManocha@csep.org for media queries.