India’s diplomatic stand is influenced by NAM and Panchsheel

Amid the on-going Russian-Ukraine crisis, India’s diplomatic strategies have once again come under the scanner and many pundits feel India should take a side (either Russia’s or Ukraine’s) in order to prevent the war from accelerating. But India has displayed a strong diplomatic character by choosing not to take sides in a situation involving the US-led NATO and Russia. Indian Prime Minister’s telephonic talk with the Russian President and India’s External Affairs minister’s talk with the Russian foreign minister have both highlighted the effort of India to stop the war by taking the path of diplomatic negotiations and dialogues on one hand and a lasting solution for this problem on the other. India’s neutral stand is mainly because all the key protagonists in the crisis are India’s close allies. Hence, India’s unaligned and diplomatic efforts. India and the US have good bilateral ties and have come together on several issues including the pandemic, climatic issues, trade and investment, and cyber security and emerging technological advancements. The USA has also been critical of China’s hostile behaviour on India’s territory and terror attacks from Pakistan. The USA has been consistently supporting India in the latter’s emergence as a global power.Both countries have tried to ensure peace in the Indo-Pacific region. In this scenario, where Ukraine wants to be a member of NATO, if India votes in favour of Russia, it might affect its bilateral relations with USA. Although Ukraine is not a NATO member, it is still considered a partner country and that is why the US, Britain, Germany, Netherlands, and Polandhave sent military help to Ukraine. This shows that a possible support to Russia might hamper India’s relations with the NATO countries, including USA.

Despite a divergent geo-political and strategic drift in India-Russia relationship with Russia embracing China and Pakistan, both being India’s diplomatic foes, the age-old India-Russia relationship still continues to remain strong. This is evident when we take into consideration that the first in-person Russian bilateral meeting since the onset of the pandemic was withIndia. Moreover, Russia has been a significant supplier of military equipment. India is also procuring the S-400 Triumf Missile from Russia, despite strong US opposition.  A deal worth over Rs. 5000 crore for the manufacture of Russian AK203 assault rifles is also in the pipeline. There are also hints of a new ten-year defence pact between the two countries. Speaking of economic relations, India-Russia annual trade is also worth about $10 billion. India’s support to Ukraine may not hamper Indian-Russian ties but might mean Russia developing stronger ties with China and Pakistan. That can be a real-time threat to India’s national security. Moreover, speaking of India and Ukraine relationship, history has shown us that Ukraine has seldom supported India. Ukraine has been consistently taking anti-Indian position in the United Nations, be it in terms of voting against India in UNSC after 1998 nuclear tests, voting for UN intervention in Kashmir after abrogation of Article 370 or in terms of selling military equipment to Pakistan to use against India. So, in this regard as well, India’s diplomatic stand in terms in abstaining support in favour of Ukraine is quite justified.India’s diplomatic stand is influenced by the non-aligned movement and the Panchsheel framework ofmutual non-aggression and non-interference.Hence, India has always been a supporter of diplomatic settlement of disputes rather than military aggressions. India wants de-escalation of the crisis, but onlythrough arbitration or conciliation. Thus, considering all the angles to this crisis, India is adopting the strategy to solve this dispute keeping in mind that any country’s national interest is above the overall global interest. 

(Kakati is an advocate in Gauhati High Court and Borthakur is a student in the Department of Politics and International Relations, Pondicherry Central University. The views expressed are personal.)