United Nations, Sep 28 (TIWN): India emerged as the voice of the South, speaking up on issues hitting them the hardest, during the high-level meeting of the UN General Assembly, reclaiming the leadership role but in a changed global context with a focus on development and cooperation, rather than shrill partisanship, and at the same time trying to be a bridge between blocs in the polarised world.

The New India "really matters more in this polarised world", said External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar, who dynamised this new avatar during the Assembly meeting last week and the many events around it, meeting over 100 leaders over six days.

If Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 2014 speech after his election set a new course for the nation, breaking free of the ideological constraints of a self-imposed "Third Worldism" and strident Non-Aligned rhetoric, eight years later a more self-confident India has returned to its embrace of the developing countries, but with a difference and showing them a new direction: Development rather than politics; bridge-building rather than confrontation.

At the same time, Jaishankar kept India's anti-colonial creds but first looking inward to forge a world outlook.

"We will liberate ourselves from a colonial mindset", he told the General Assembly. "Externally, this means reformed multilateralism and more contemporary global governance."

For India, global governance reform starts with Security Council reforms and here New Delhi got support across blocs at the General Assembly meeting from both the US and Russia, as well as other countries.

It is the only country to get the backing of both Washington and Moscow.

India now has a "tailwind" on its quest for a permanent seat on the Security Council, Jaishankar said at a news conference.

It was probably the first time an Indian leader spoke at the UN about liberation from the "colonial mindset" that had informed its rhetoric and reactions.

"Our rich civilisational heritage will be a source of pride and of strength", he said.

And of the significance of India's 75th anniversary of Independence, he said India's people are "rejuvenating a society pillaged by centuries of foreign attacks and colonialism" -- packing in a pointed reference to also invasions from around the region.

As to why "India matters more" is that in a polarised world, it is "the bridge, we are the voice, we are a viewpoint channel", he said at a news conference, adding: "I think for a country like India, which has so many relationships and such an ability to communicate and to find touch points for different countries and regions" makes it fit for the role.

Recognition came from France's President Emmanuel Macron, who said at the General Assembly: "Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India, was right when he said the time is not for war, it is not for revenge against the West or for opposing the West against the East. It is the time, for a collective time, for our sovereign equal states to come together with challenges we face."