India's Foreign Policy

Foreign policy is an expression of a country’s perception of and projection to the world of its national interest. India has always had a conspicuous element of moral values in the formulation of foreign policy. Thus, even if India promotes self interest, it is an enlightened one. However, there is a mix of pragmatism and idealism, best reflected in its decisions to abstain from joining the NPT and CTBT, while remaining committed to non-proliferation and a nuclear free world. While taking steps to weaponise its nuclear programme, India proclaimed unilateral moratorium on further tests as well as no-first use. India took unambiguous positions when NPT signatories such as Iran and North Korea seemed to depart from their international commitments. India can enrich existing debates by offering alternative ideas such as ‘Responsibility while Protecting’ (RwP) alongside ‘Responsibility to Protect’ (R2P), ‘development partnership’ rather than ‘economic aid’ and ‘engagement’ rather than ‘confrontation or containment’. These formulations/reformulations help infuse existing concepts with sensibilities/sensitivities that are in tune with the needs of India. However, Indian perspective involves not just revisiting existing debates and issues, but also re-conceptualizing them. Some such conceptualizing / reconceptualising emanating from India includes the notion of non-violence, Satyagraha, non-alignment, Panchsheel, human development/security and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities. The changing contours of the Indian economy need to be understood in the context of significant shifts in global economic power. Instead of India merely replicating others, there is an urgent need to revisit global monetary and fiscal best practices and develop alternative New Delhi Consensus to the dominant Washington/Beijing consensus. The leading role that India has come to play in the global economy is demonstrated in the WTO multilateral trade talks and in the debates over the reform of the global financial architecture. On other issues such as climate change, human rights and terrorism, the predominant view of India cannot be ignored by the international community while attempting to re-conceptualize the evolving global and regional orders. How India accommodates hegemonic United States, rising China and assertive neighbours will have a profound impact upon India’s foreign policy. Indian foreign policy and India’s approach to the conduct of the foreign relations therefore will have to be an extremely pragmatic one which despite its idealist content should be based on the harsh realities of International Politics.