Off-centre | Needed, a grand strategy for India: But why are we so shy about it?

Early in their introduction to India’s Grand Strategy: History, Theory, Cases (2014), the volume’s editors, Kanti Bajpai, Saira Basit, and V Krishnappa, admit: “Indians are not terribly comfortable with the term ‘grand strategy.’” Why are reactions to the term “grand strategy,” especially when applied to India, “usually pejorative”? Let us consider one, probably extreme, but prevalent perspective emanating from our northeastern borders. China. The world’s second and still rising superpower, possibly soon to be numero uno. Our greatest adversary. With whom, we can forget only to our own detriment, that we share a border of nearly 3,500 km. A border longer by over 150 km than our barbed wire fence with Pakistan. As former foreign secretary and one of India’s senior-most China hands, Shyam Saran, remarks in his recent book, How China Sees India and The World (2022), “China looked upon India as a ‘slave nation’ ruled by a foreign power during the British colonial period.” If so, how can a “slave nation” have a grand strategy? Perhaps, the view of our erstwhile colonial masters was not all that different from such openly articulated derision by the red dragon, breathing down our Himalayan borders. After all, the former “proved” that we were not one nation by engineering the world’s bloodiest divisions of territory and largest transfers of population when India was partitioned on the eve of our independence. It is this theme of never-ending partition that the “breaking India” forces echo and activate, almost at will, to this day. Why, even well-meaning, “centrist” public intellectuals, such as Ramachandra Guha, have recounted quite openly, “Ten Reasons Why India Will Not and Must Not Become a Superpower”.

Delivered some 13 years back on a lecture tour in Canada, this lecture still bears listening to. Rather attentively, in fact. Guha lists 10 of the most significant threats that India faces, not just to our stability, but to our very existence. These detriments to our greatness include Left-wing Insurgency, “Aggressive Right-wing Hindu Fundamentalism”, the Family Firm and Erosion of the Political Centre, the Corruption and Decline of Public Institutions, the Growing Gap between the Rich and the Poor, Environmental Degradation, Apathy of the Media, Fragmentation of the Political System, Disturbances in the Northeast and Kashmir, and an Unstable Neighbourhood. Just how far we have come from Guha’s gloomy prognostications is obvious not only in India’s economic and strategic progress since 2014, when Narendra Modi took over the reins of the nation. It is also amply evident in cutting down to size the multiple family firms of politicians and also stanching if not solving the bleeding Maoist insurgency in central India. The media is also much more proactive, even if marshalled along political lines, then apathetic to the enduring interests of the nation. As to the gap between the rich and the poor, that may have increased, but the poor have done significantly better. An estimated over half a billion of them have risen out of abject poverty, thanks at least partly to the many schemes and measures of the government. Kashmir and North East are much more peaceful than ever before, especially the latter. Environmental degradation, if not reversed, is at least right on top of the agenda, with India playing a leading role in global climate control protocols. Most importantly, as against Guha’s warning of political fragmentation, we have greater cohesion and a sense of national purpose than most Indians have witnessed in living memory. If so, why are we so shy, if not coy, when it comes to calling for a grand strategy for India? The normal response is that we have no well-thought-out vision, let alone a well-articulated action plan to make us a great power. Instead, there has been a tendency, if not tradition, to react to challenges and crises, rather than being proactive in anticipating and countering them. Moreover, as Bajpai et al claim, India is “a modest and prudential power,” not at all ambitious enough to aspire to anything like a grand strategy to position itself in the world as power to be reckoned with. Can there be any doubt that even as we celebrate the 75th anniversary of India’s independence, so eloquently branded as “Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav”, we cannot afford to rest on our laurels or dwell too much on our past? By the same token, can there be a better time than now to make concrete plans and projects for our next quarter of a century than this vantage point of India@75? Now is the time to start thinking, talking, and working towards India@100. To this end, all elements of a grand strategy — political, economic, military, diplomatic, cultural, and civilisational — in other words, hard, soft, and smart power — should be thoroughly thought through and marshalled in the years leading up to India: 2047. What is more, not just the political class, but the interested and able citizenry at large should be involved and own up this process, rather than feeling left out of it. What steps might we endeavour take towards such a lofty and noble end? How can we work together to make India the best possible version of itself in the quarter century to come? It is not so much in comparison with others that we should strive, but manifest our own innate and inner potential and genius — the svadharma of our svarajya. That should be our path and goal. Indeed, that would be the yugadharma, the demand of the times. (To be continued) The writer is an author, columnist, and professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University. Views expressed are personal. Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News, India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.