Contents: Foreword/A.N. Ram. Preface. List of contributors. Introduction/T. Nirmala Devi. I. India's role in BIMSTEC: 1. India and BIMSTEC: experiment with sub-regional cooperation/P.V. Rao. 2. India's role in BIMSTEC: prospects and problems/A. Lakshmana Chetty. 3. India's trade and investment opportunities in BIMSTEC/Indra Nath Mukherji and Nawal K. Paswan. 4. India's new regionalism in Asia: Look East and BIMSTEC interface/Tridib Chakraborthy. II. Cooperation in trade and investment in BIMSTEC: 5. Challenges and opportunities for BIMSTEC/K.C. Reddy. 6. Economic cooperation in BIMSTEC: emerging trends and prospects/T. Nirmala Devi. 7. Regional economic arrangements: understanding the growth of BIMSTEC/Padmaja Murthy. 8. Evolution of BIMSTEC: towards a Bay of Bengal economic community/P. Leela. 9. Possibilities of cooperation in BIMSTEC countries/K. Sreerama Murthy, K. Sailaja and R. Radha. III. Political perspectives on BIMSTEC: 10. Development of BIMSTEC: nature and direction, challenges and issues/B.C. Upreti. 11. Political and foreign policy perspectives of BIMSTEC/M. Chandrasekhar and G. Ravi Kumar Rao. 12. Indo-Sri Lanka maritime co-operation: implications on The Bay of Bengal/V. Srilatha. 13. Re-envisioning India-Myanmar Relations/B. Meena Rao and S. Subba Rao. 14. A study on India's political-economic relations with some BIMSTEC nations/A. Vanajamani. IV. Cooperation in science and technology in BIMSTEC: 15. Coastal and oceanic resources of Bay of Bengal -- scope for scientific and technical collaboration/P. Rajendra Prasad. 16. Some views on possible collaboration in science and technology among Bay of Bengal economic community with emphasis on space, earth and atmospheric sciences/A. Narayana Swamy and A. Sivaparvathi. 17. International cooperation in BIMSTEC for marine archaeology/E.V. Gangadharam. V. Human development and other aspects of BIMSTEC: 18. The Asian drama of BIMSTEC, SAARC, and ASEAN countries/G. Ramachandrudu, Ch. Appa Rao and A. Rajani. 19. Strategies for the achievement of regional cooperation in BIMSTEC with special focus on road transport/D. Panduranga Rao and K.V. Mohan Kumar. 20. Disaster management and BIMSTEC: special focus on Indian scenario/C. Praseeda. 21. Social and economic aspects of development in BIMSTEC with special focus on women/P. Tara Kumari. 22. Gender mainstreaming in trade policies in BIMSTEC/B. Ratnakumari. 23. Gender inequity in BIMSTEC countries: an overview/G. Lakshmi and S. Vanaja Rani. Appendices. Index.
"The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Techno Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) is a sub regional grouping. It is positively perceived as a bridge between the SAARC and the ASEAN regional groupings, as it embraces five SAARC members, viz., Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan and two ASEAN members, Myanmar and Thailand, around the Bay of Bengal and the Eastern Coast of the Indian Ocean. Formed in 1997 with the main objective of promoting cooperation among the contiguous countries of the Bay of Bengal, the BIMSTEC has identified six agreed areas of cooperation, viz., trade and investment; technology; transport and communication; energy; tourism; and fisheries.
With the changing image and the recent economic clout, India's increasing engagement with the ASEAN nations collectively and individually is a positive step in the direction of its Look East Policy.
Though not all potential areas of sub regional cooperation in the BIMSTEC have received adequate attention in this volume, it is yet a pioneering effort in launching an exclusive collected work on the subject, as the literature on the BIMSTEC is very inadequate and wanting." (jacket)
