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India’s national interests, protected through strategic autonomy, much discussed and debated over the decades and fiercely defended in recent years, have at their core the idea of national security. This proposition has been told loud and clear, especially under the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. While this has been a policy of continuity in India’s national politics, the current government has amplified it, making it a part of its nationalist ideology. Since it is a plank from which the ruling party derives its strength and authority, the opposition is often forced to attack it and criticise it, sending a polarised message to its people, to its neighbouring countries, and to the wider world. Since the border skirmishes that took the lives of twenty Indian soldiers in 2020 along the border with China, the ruling government, hiding the facts on the ground by denying at first, has often refused a discussion on it, blaming the lack of importance given to national security by the previous governments under the Indian National Congress party. The subsequent political melee has only confused and misguided the common citizen and the media. But off late, this political slugfest on national security has taken the form of a confused silence, displayed both by the government and the opposition. It seems both are discounting its political impact for their own reasons and are occupied in contesting on other domestic issues, which are no less important but are often separated from the national discourse. As a rising power, especially in a contested neighbourhood, India is expected to strategise effectively a broader national security strategy since its own security is intertwined and overlaps with its neighbours and, in recent years, with the Western world, which views India as a major balancing power to China. Western powers and some of the major economies of Southeast Asia have displayed patience in accommodating and understanding the limitations of domestic politics, India’s energy and economic dependency, and its resulting reticence to explicitly join statements of collective security concerns calling out the revisionist power(s) that is causing trouble to peace and stability in today’ world. India’s participation in certain blocs where China is also part of makes it difficult for her to frame a robust plan to deal with common issues in the region with the other members there since bilateral competition also spills over in the multilateral groupings, thus impacting the ability to deliver on joint objectives. The current geopolitics, favourable for India when it is being courted by every major power, needs to be scrutinised deeply, together with the aspect of whether India’s lasting ambiguity in strategic affairs in the region and abroad guarantees any advancements on its security interests in and away from its region. This takes further importance in the absence of continued peace and stability on its western and northern borders and increasingly in the Indo-Pacific. The absence of its own formal national strategic security document projects her as a reactionary middle power. This perceptional weakness or ambiguity was historically given a positive definition for decades, calling it an openness to engage, beneficial for mutual peace and political stability, and being a catalyst for a future of mutual growth and stability in the region. This dream of India has been shattered through misplaced optimism on China for decades and due to its obsession with the neighbour on the West. The alliance building and the point of multi- alignment are not missed by anyone in the world of geopolitics, but the inherent limitations of the same points to a void on India’s long- term strategy in its own security and its vision for the neighbourhood and the world. The decades-old thinking of the political class has been to pluck the low-hanging fruits in reforms concerned with economy and defence that are often poorly executed, and not having an official strategic document to adhere to makes it easier for them to play around with the inevitable needs of economic and defence security. This kicking-the-can down the road has negatively impacted its own military, bureaucracy, and strategic circles in their planning. The defence reforms, mainly of manufacturing in India with the transfer of technology, are often on the headlines without any mention of the deadlines. There are often ad hoc defence deals taking place in half measures, thanks to domestic and sometimes international political pressures. The much debated economic reforms have often been a subject to political convenience and blamed on federal democracy rather than on the absence of a strategic document for long-term planning and the lack of adherence to it across the political spectrum. The multilateral engagement and upgrade of bilateral engagements have not been an all-encompassing deterrent against the major threat that India is facing because India is limited by its own national domestic politics, which has been highly polarised on anything that it lacks or on reforms. This also has never been helpful in most bilateral and multilateral relations, dampening prospects and potentials of attractive trade and defence agreements. The importance given to domestic political costs/embarrassment and the apparent perception of surrender of strategic autonomy are overplayed as a cover for political and bureaucratic incompetence. It also covers for the lack of consistency and ambiguity in political decision-making towards its own strategic interests. The recent thaw at the border, seen as a step towards stability rather than normalcy, has given India a political breather, but the ineffective nature of the existing border protocols and the lack of political coherence to work on a strategic security document safeguarding India’s borders and other vital interests remain. The obvious lack of clarity of the new arrangement and the lack of effort from the government to have a discussion in the parliament and in taking the public into confidence point to the inability of the government to change the national political discourse in the needed direction. There is a broader understanding of how India is constrained economically and militarily and the need for timely reforms for its transition, but it seems the political class is living in a shell and not the common Indian, who knows the major power imbalance at play between India and China. The major push by India’ business interests in influencing the government’ decision to reach out for a thaw at the border indicates how India’ economic interests triumph over security interests at the border and the apparent lack of strategies at hand to counter such a dependency. India, aided and saved by geopolitics, which also included the return of President Trump, saw an opportunity to find temporary strategic peace on the borders but with no guarantee on the sustainability of peace and dialogue on the border. The arrangements that are out in the public domain have increased the ambiguity on the border and its technicalities, and the return of Chinese investments works politically for the Chinese at least in the near future, keeping India on the tenterhooks. The border agreements have been violated multiple times by China, and the aggressor gets away without much public backlash thanks to the way the government has handled this issue since its beginning. Similarly, in terms of economic interests, India is not going to get reciprocal market access or transfer of technology in advanced technology and manufacturing from China. India’s increasing engagement with Europe, seen as a game changer but dampened by India’s own skill problem, causes the progress and results to not be immediately given. The strategic window is not open forever, and the neighbours and the extended neighbourhood are watching India’s progress even as they fret over their own economic and national security, in which they see India’s rise playing a major role in the near future. India’s armed forces, economic and business interests, political interests and policies, and foreign policy choices and engagements need long-term strategic planning, synchronisation, and bipartisan political support and commitment. This is what underscores the need for a National Strategic Security document that gives much-needed clarity to itself and its partners.
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