Bulgaria–India relations (

Bulgarian Bulgarian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Bulgaria * Bulgarians, a South Slavic ethnic group * Bulgarian language, a Slavic language * Bulgarian alphabet * A citizen of Bulgaria, see Demographics of Bulgaria * Bul ...

: Българо-индийските отношения;

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...

: बुल्गारिया-भारत संबंध) are the international relations that exist between the Republic of Bulgaria and the

Republic of India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. Bulgaria has an embassy in

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...

and honorary consulates in

Hyderabad Hyderabad ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana and the ''de jure'' capital of Andhra Pradesh. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part ...

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

and

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second- ...

. The embassy is jointly accredited to Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, the Maldives and Bhutan, and also observes the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). India has an embassy in

Sofia Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and ha ...

, that is also jointly accredited to Macedonia. In mid-1954, preliminary negotiations were held between Bulgaria and India in Moscow, and diplomatic relations were established in December 1954. Bulgaria opened a diplomatic mission (Legation) in New Delhi in April 1955. The mission was re-organized into an embassy in March 1961. India's diplomatic representatives to Bulgaria resided in Belgrade and Bucharest from July 1955 until April 1970. India opened its embassy in Sofia in May 1970. Indira Gandhi became the first Indian Prime Minister to visit Bulgaria in October 1967.

Todor Zhivkov Todor Hristov Zhivkov ( bg, Тодор Христов Живков ; 7 September 1911 – 5 August 1998) was a Bulgarian communist statesman who served as the ''de facto'' leader of the People's Republic of Bulgaria (PRB) from 1954 until 1989 ...

was the first Bulgarian Prime Minister to visit India in January 1969. Gandhi visited Bulgaria again in 1981. Presidents

V.V. Giri Varahagiri Venkata Giri (; 10 August 1894 — 24 June 1980) was an Indian politician and activist from Berhampur in Odisha who served as the 4th president of India from 24 August 1969 to 24 August 1974. He also 3rd vice president of India from ...

visited Bulgaria in 1976, Sanjiva Reddy in 1980,

S. D. Sharma Shankar Dayal Sharma (; 19 August 1918 – 26 December 1999) was an Indian lawyer and politician from the state of Madhya Pradesh who served as the ninth President of India, from 1992 to 1997. Born in Bhopal, Sharma studied at Agra, Allahaba ...

in 1994, and

A.P.J. Abdul Kalam Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam (; 15 October 193127 July 2015) was an Indian aerospace scientist and statesman who served as the 11th President of India from 2002 to 2007. He was born and raised in Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu and studied phy ...

in 2003. Bulgarian President Todor Zhivkov visited India in 1976 and 1983, and President Peter Stoyanov visited in 1998. Prime Minister

Stanko Todorov Stanko Todorov Georgiev () (10 December 1920 – 17 December 1996) was a Bulgarian communist politician. Todorov was born in Pernik Province. Before and during World War II he was a worker. He became interested in communism, and joined the und ...

visited India in 1974 and 1980, and Prime Minister

Sergei Stanishev Sergey Dmitrievich Stanishev ( bg, Сергей Дмитриевич Станишев ; born 5 May 1966) is a Bulgarian politician who is serving as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP). He previously served as President of the Party of Eu ...

visited in 2007. The first bilateral protocol for trade exchange was signed between the two countries in New Delhi on 16 September 1956, and the first agreement for economic, scientific and technical cooperation was signed in Sofia on 2 May 1967. A Joint Commission for Economic, Scientific & Technical Cooperation (with sub-branches for machine-building, electronics, agriculture, chemistry, defense industry, food industry, etc.) was established in November 1973. In 1975, the first cultural agreement between Bulgaria and India was signed. In 2020, Bulgarian prime minister

Boyko Borissov Boyko Metodiev Borisov ( bg, Бойко Методиев Борисов, ; born 13 June 1959) is a Bulgarian politician who served as the prime minister of Bulgaria from 2009 to 2013, 2014 to 2017, and 2017 to 2021, making him Bulgaria's List of ...

recorded a video message to Indian prime minister

Narendra Modi Narendra Damodardas Modi (; born 17 September 1950) is an Indian politician serving as the 14th and current Prime Minister of India since 2014. Modi was the Chief Minister of Gujarat from 2001 to 2014 and is the Member of Parliament from ...

on the occasion of

International Yoga Day The International Day of Yoga has been celebrated across the world annually on June 21 since 2015, following its inception in the United Nations General Assembly in 2014. Yoga is a physical, mental and spiritual practice which originated in ...

. Bilateral trade between Bulgaria and India totaled $338.09 million in 2018-19.

Bilateral Commercial and Economic Relations

Bilateral Treaties and Agreements

India and Bulgaria together signed agreements on Tourism, Avoidance of Double Taxation, Combating Organized Crime, International Terrorism and Illicit Trafficking in Narcotics and Psychotropic substances, Protocol on Foreign Office Consultations, Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement, Air Services Agreement, Defence Cooperation, Science and Technology, Extradition, Cooperation in Youth Affairs and Sports, Information Technologies, Economic Cooperation, Treaty on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters, Treaty on Mutual Legal Assistance in Civil and Commercial Matters, Treaty on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons, Protocol for Amending the Agreement for the Promotion and Protection of Investment, Protocol of Intent on Labour Relations, Employment and Social Security, Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises Development, abolition of visa requirement for holders of Diplomatic and Official Passports, Programme of Cooperation in the field of Science & Technology, Programme of Cooperation in the field of Health and Medicine and Programme for Cooperation in the Fields of Science, Education and Culture, Civil Nuclear Cooperation etc.

Cultural Relations

Until 2020, the two countries has signed 17 Cultural Exchange Programmes and the last one was signed in

in March 2018 for the period 2018-20. The important milestone in developing literary relationship between India and Bulgaria was

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...

winner

Rabindranath Tagore Rabindranath Tagore (; bn, রবীন্দ্রনাথ ঠাকুর; 7 May 1861 – 7 August 1941) was a Bengali polymath who worked as a poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer and painter. He resh ...

’s visit to Bulgaria in 1926. Indian classics like

Ramayana The ''Rāmāyana'' (; sa, रामायणम्, ) is a Sanskrit literature, Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epic composed over a period of nearly a millennium, with scholars' estimates for the earliest stage of the text ranging from the 8th ...

Mahabharata The ''Mahābhārata'' ( ; sa, महाभारतम्, ', ) is one of the two major Sanskrit epics of ancient India in Hinduism, the other being the ''Rāmāyaṇa''. It narrates the struggle between two groups of cousins in the Kuruk ...

Vedas upright=1.2, The Vedas are ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism. Above: A page from the '' Atharvaveda''. The Vedas (, , ) are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed in Vedic Sanskrit, the texts constitute the ...

Upanishads The Upanishads (; sa, उपनिषद् ) are late Vedic Sanskrit texts that supplied the basis of later Hindu philosophy.Wendy Doniger (1990), ''Textual Sources for the Study of Hinduism'', 1st Edition, University of Chicago Press, , ...

Bhagavat Gita The Bhagavad Gita (; sa, श्रीमद्भगवद्गीता, lit=The Song by God, translit=śrīmadbhagavadgītā;), often referred to as the Gita (), is a 700- verse Hindu scripture that is part of the epic ''Mahabharata'' (c ...

and

Panchatantra The ''Panchatantra'' (IAST: Pañcatantra, ISO: Pañcatantra, sa, पञ्चतन्त्र, "Five Treatises") is an ancient Indian collection of interrelated animal fables in Sanskrit verse and prose, arranged within a frame story.

stories and modern authors like Prem Chand,

Mulk Raj Anand Mulk Raj Anand (12 December 1905 – 28 September 2004) was an Indian writer in English, recognised for his depiction of the lives of the poorer castes in traditional Indian society. One of the pioneers of Indo-Anglian fiction, he, togethe ...

, Amrita Pritam etc. are very popular among Bulgarians. Similarly, literary works of Bulgarian poets like Hristo Botev,

Hristo Smyrensky Hristo ( bg, Христо, also spelled Khristo) is a Bulgarian masculine given name, ultimately derived from "Christ". Notable people with the name include: * Hristo Arangelov (born 1978), Bulgarian footballer * Hristo Batandzhiev (died 1913), B ...

, Nikola Vaptsarov are widely translated to Indian languages. Katya Tosheva, a Bulgarian practices Yoga, an ancient Indian exercise and mastered the Indian classical dances of Bharatnatyam, Kathak and Odissi. As a part of the Centre for Eastern Languages and Cultures, Sofia University has an Indology Department. To promote the implementation of Indology in diverse ways and at different levels, East-West Indological Foundation was established in 1997. Indian embassy in Bulgaria actively organizes a number of high profile cultural events.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bulgaria-India relations India Bilateral relations of India

Bilateral Commercial and Economic Relations

Bilateral Treaties and Agreements

Cultural Relations

See also

References