"Without accountability for emissions and delivery of finance, climate summits risk becoming exercises in narrative-building." Discuss with reference to India's interests.

UNEP's 2026 report concedes that limiting warming to 1.5°C with no or limited overshoot is no longer possible [1]. Unless summits settle who emitted and who pays, such labels will replace action, at India's particular cost.

Accountability deficit

• Pledge optics: Full NDC delivery implies 2.3–2.5°C, down from 2.6–2.8°C; but methodological updates explain 0.1°C and US withdrawal cancels another 0.1°C [2].
• Unverifiable promises: A 2100 return to 1.5°C cannot be audited today. Yet IPCC warns that overshoot brings irreversible impacts, growing with its size and duration, and that greater carbon removal raises feasibility concerns [3].
• Anonymous language: "Overshoot" describes one global temperature curve and names no emitter, unlike a divisible carbon budget.

Finance deficit

• Contested goal: COP29's climate-finance goal (NCQG) was adopted despite India's objection; India says it leaves out Paris Article 9.1, which obliges developed countries to provide finance [4].
• Poor quality: Loan-dominated finance restricts absorptive capacity; India seeks grants for adaptation to avoid more debt [4].
• Low confidence: The Economic Survey 2024-25 found little optimism in the NCQG outcome about support to developing countries [5].

Stakes for India

• Equity: India contributed about 4% of cumulative emissions (1850–2019) with one-sixth of humanity, and argues it has used far less than its fair share [6].
• Burden-sharing: Steeper post-peak declines would squeeze latecomers; India wants finance to reflect developed countries' historical share of cumulative emissions [4].
• Implementation: Without sufficient finance, India warns, even proposed NDCs would not materialise [4].
• Vulnerability: IPCC flags irreversible harm to mountain and coastal ecosystems [3], relevant to the Himalaya and coasts.

Why summits still matter

• Honest signalling: Cutting emissions 26% by 2030 and 46% by 2035 would hold overshoot to about 0.3°C [2], making the term a spur to action.
• Universal forum: India itself calls the UNFCCC the primary forum, unlike the less representative G7 and G20 [4].
• India's own test: The atmosphere counts every new tonne; history settles responsibility, not physics, so India must show its rising emissions serve development.

Summits remain indispensable only when narrative is anchored in numbers. Capping overshoot's height and duration, and aligning finance with historical responsibility, would give CBDR-RC and SDG 13 real meaning and secure India's development space.