A rigid policy

India’s relations with most of its neighbouring and regional states have turned sour over the last few years. Besides its historical rivalries, India’s inflexible approaches have also resulted in unending tensions between India and other countries.

The failures of its regional foreign policy have pushed India into a position where it is surrounded by states that resent it. India’s relations with its larger northern neighbour China have remained antagonistic due to the two countries’ territorial and border disputes dating back to the 1950s and the war of 1962. The May 2020 border clashes between Chinese and Indian soldiers in the bordering region of Ladakh further hurt the countries’ ties.

Although efforts were made to hold about 20 rounds of military talks to dilute the tensions, clashes between the soldiers continued in 2022 and 2023 as well, as India attempted to exert its dominance. India is the only state in the region that is opposed to China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and has proposed an alternative economic corridor, the India-Middle East Economic Initiative (IMEC), at the G20 Summit in New Delhi in September 2023.

This shows that regardless of being part of common forums with China such as G20, the SCO and the newly emerging BRICS, India’s foreign policy has failed to cooperate with China, and the two countries do not see eye to eye on several multilateral agendas.

India, instead of developing a cooperative regional approach, has been hell-bent on competing economically and militarily with China even though India’s financial and defence experts believe that this is not possible. New Delhi’s active role in the Indo-Pacific strategy and its policy towards Taiwan are major tussles between the two states, leading to strained ties between the two giant neighbours.

India is also competing against China to maintain its influence in neighbouring states like the Maldives, Bhutan, Myanmar and Afghanistan; however, so far Indian foreign policy has failed to achieve this goal.

India’s approach towards smaller neighbouring states has also been fraudulent. Instead of developing friendly working relations with all governments in neighbouring states, it has only maintained cordial relations with the governments favouring India. This was evident in India’s massive support for the reelection of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. However, this approach failed when the new Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu came to power with the slogan ‘India Out.’

India’s temporary dominance in the Maldives was challenged when President Muizzu, soon after coming to power, ordered the expulsion of Indian troops from its territory and preferred a trip to China over India, unlike previous presidents.

To slash the Maldivian tourism-based economy as a foreign policy response, PM Modi attempted to reroute Indian vacationers by promoting the beauty of the remote island of Lakshadweep and posted pictures of himself on the island. It merits a mention that he had barely heeded to violence in Manipur (also known as heaven on earth) that erupted last year. This shows another prominent failure of India’s foreign policy and depicts the country’s double standards.

The deceptive approach has been prominent under India’s so-called neighbourhood-first policy which appears to develop a regional connectivity framework, but in reality, is only a tool for India to exert coercive control on the regional state.

With Nepal, India has attempted to strengthen economic ties and connectivity through railway lines and energy transit; however, India’s assertive behaviour, when it unveiled the so-called Akhand Baharat mural in the Indian Parliament, met with strong resistance from Nepal. Anti-India sentiments under the slogan ‘#BackoffIndia’ and ‘respect Nepal’s sovereignty’ have been gaining momentum in Nepal due to India’s assertive posture.

Similarly, Minister of External Affairs of India S Jaishankar, during his visit to Tehran (January 14-15), attempted to redraw attention to the long outstanding Chabahar Port that aims to develop connectivity between India, Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia. However, India’s treatment of Muslims at home, Iran’s opposing stance on the Israel-Palestine conflict and its support for drone attacks on US forces in Iraq, Jordan and Syria would put India at odds with the US. This illustrates that India’s foreign policy in Iran could also not bear the fruit it desires.

Since the US withdrawal from Kabul, India has tried various approaches to not let the Taliban interim government fall under the influence of China and Pakistan. While India has only maintained its technical eyes and ears in Kabul, Afghanistan had to close down its embassy in New Delhi due to a lack of Indian cooperation. This has paralyzed diplomatic ties between the two states. A rare thaw was sighted when Taliban Envoy Badruddin Haqqani was invited as a Republic Day guest in Abu Dhabi. However, India’s stance on Afghanistan’s interim government has failed to develop friendly ties with the country.

India’s ties with its eastern neighbour Pakistan have been adversarial since Independence. Pakistan recently announced having credible evidence of India’s role behind extrajudicial and extraterritorial killings on its territory. After Canada and the US, Pakistan is the third country to publicly condemn India’s illegal role in state-sponsored terrorism.

India’s foreign policy is a depiction of bullying behaviour that has failed to develop neighbourly ties. The incidents of February 2019, where the defence forces of Pakistan and India engaged in tit-for-tat skirmishes, further downgraded bilateral ties.

As elections draw closer in India, there remains a threat of a potential false flag operation, which may sour the two countries’ ties further. India’s unilateral action of August 2019 has already put a tough condition on the normalization of ties between the two states. In 2024, there could be some attempt to catch some low-hanging fruits; however, the sustainability of such an action and the influence of spoilers could mar this effort.

India’s regional foreign policy approach has massively failed in all its endeavours in recent years. The country has maintained a stubborn and rigid approach towards regional states, and its position on regional and border disputes has hardened. Due to this, India is surrounded by an unfavourable environment that lowers the chances of its enhanced role in the region. This calls for India to fix its attitude as an assertive and inflexible approach is unsustainable for peace and development in the region.

The writer is a research analyst in emerging technologies and international security. She tweets/posts

@MaheenShafeeq