Since the climate summit in Glasgow, it is India that has taken on the role of the global climate villain, those who sabotaged what could have been a historic climate agreement.

But it was China that sent India forward to send the shocking news that they had changed their "f-word", fossil fuels.

An already diluted formulation became almost incomprehensible, as some coal power would be "phased down" instead of "phased out".

The chairman of COP26 in Glasgow, Alok Sharma, was so upset that he burst into tears.

It may seem completely incomprehensible that for decades there have been negotiations to reduce greenhouse gases without mentioning fossil sources called the Paris Agreement from 2015, which does not contain the words coal, oil, natural gas or even fossil fuels.

They have been politically impossible.

Now it was going to happen.

But then only coal was mentioned.

Coal, which is the energy source of the poor countries, both reliable and cheap. 

Natural gas, on the other hand, is not mentioned, the fossil energy source that Europe and the United States intend to use as a "bridge" during the green transition.

It really irritates countries like India and Nigeria.

The right to development

For the battle is so much bigger than it is about the climate.

It is an existential struggle that is going on, for the right to development.

When India set its end date to reach net zero by 2070, 20 years later than when the international community said it had to happen, it was a deliberate provocation.

They believe that they never said yes to obeying during the same strict time frame as e.g.

US and EU member states with net zero by 2050.

India's energy needs are expected to grow faster than any other country in the next 20 years.

Prime Minister Modi has promised that no Indian will live more than ten miles away from an airport, in an attempt to stop the depopulation of the countryside.

At the same time, they are trying to go from coal power to solar power.

Before the pandemic, India is on track to reach 50 percent renewable by 2030, despite rich countries' broken promises of climate aid.

Swedes consume four times more

For decades, India has pushed the line that the rich countries have a historical debt to the ongoing emissions.

Even though India is the world's third largest emitting country, every Indian's ecological footprint is small, a Swede, for example, consumes four times more.

These are arguments that most countries in Asia and Africa have supported and inspired by and that have deepened climate polarization between the south and the north.

Another sign of this came this weekend, when Egypt, which is chairing COP27 in November, said that 2022 is Africa's turn.

Now, like India, they will assert their right to use fossil fuels in order to have economic growth.

Wants rich countries to pay for natural disasters

Then the claim for "loss and damage" will also be raised, ie the new economic claim for damages that India and others are making against rich countries.

We must pay the bill for the material damage that occurs in natural disasters, because the IPCC in August stated that it is climate change that is behind it.

To date, the rich world has not even lived up to the requirement to pay the promised $ 100 billion in climate aid.

THAT is the second cause of India's anger.

That's why Glasgow's Prime Minister Modi issued another shocking vote, demanding $ 1 trillion in climate aid.

The conflict over time frames and climate finance will continue to govern the global climate policy agenda.

It is nine months until the next climate summit.

Click on the clip to see Erika Bjerström in the Foreign Office and see more about India's climate work in the Foreign Office: The villain in Glasgow on SVT2 at 10 pm or on SVT Play from 7.30 pm tonight.