The last three years have seen an outpouring of works on ports, Rila Mukherjee ed. Vanguards of Globalization: Port-Cities from the Classical to the Modern, Sara Keller and Michael Pearson eds. Port Towns of Gujarat and Marie-Francoise Boussac, Jean-Francois Salles, Jean-Baptiste Yon eds. Ports of the Ancient Indian Ocean. Incidentally all three are Primus publications.
To a generation born around 1947, Independence Day was a beacon of hope, sparkling with excitement at the idea of building a modern nation-state, freed from the shackles of colonialism. The stalwarts of the National Movement had spent long years in prisons and had had the opportunity to reflect and hone clear-cut ideas about how the newly-independent India that is Bharat was to be shaped. Traumatized by the blows dealt by Partition, they were determined to build a secular, democratic Republic, governed by a Constitution which would ensure freedom, equality, justice and dignity for all; to hit at the roots of casteism, communalism, fissiparous tendencies and other divisive forces within the body politic. And so it began: on the midnight of August 14, 1947, ‘India awoke to life and freedom
Seventy-five is an old age for a man but relatively young for a republic or state, even more so for our ancient nation. How has India’s foreign policy done since Independence in 1947?To answer that question, we must first establish metrics to measure success or failure. In India’s case that metric is obvious and simple: the extent to which we are able to transform the lives of Indian citizens so that they live in a prosperous, secure and modern state where every Indian has the opportunity to realize his potential. In other words, the transformation of India into what we want, not what we have.
In this 75th year of the existence of India as an independent state, the month of May brought on a cruel heatwave. Indians are accustomed to the difficult life, and heat has been, for large swathes of the country, a permanent fixture on the list of cruelties. Yet, no matter what methods we have devised to stave it off, the experience simply worsens by the year because of human induced climate change, and all methods fail to give respite.
This book analyses the impact of climate change in South Asia and its environmental and socio-economic fallouts. It looks at climate change in the region from an interdisciplinary perspective and recommends some policy measures for addressing climate change. The title of the book is interesting and suggests how South Asia is the most vulnerable region of the world to climate change.
Indian history has a thousand lessons to offer. Two of them stand out—not counting the one that says that those who don’t know history are condemned to re-live it. The first lesson is well-known: India is a tempting target for marauders of every kind. The second is less known: India is never quite prepared to defend itself. It is particularly slow at manufacturing weapons. Even today it imports them, a whole lot of them, acquiring in the process the dubious distinction of being one of the biggest importers of weapons in the world—and creating, as a result, a host of problems for itself.
Rajesh Kumar seeks to cover the broad canvas of India’s most important bilateral relationship i.e., with the US, in this book which examines the politico-strategic relations between the two countries from the early years of India’s Independence to the present.The author starts off by studying the period between 1947-1984 and examines how relations between New Delhi and Washington evolved during this period. However, by way of introduction, the author gives definitions of foreign policy, national interest, etc., which might be of little interest to erudite readers though it would be useful to students
India-China relations, since Independence 1947/Liberation 1949, have swung between romance and rancour. Romanticism was based on our shared civilizational interactions; rancour on the contradictions that emerged from the hard-headed practicality of two Westphalia states pursuing their perceived national interests as they have evolved over the last seven decades plus.
Two and a half years after Chinese troops amassed and transgressed points on the Line of Actual Control with India, there isn’t a definitive answer on just why Beijing carried out its aggression. Is this about history and reclaiming areas that once belonged to Tibet? Or is it in line with China’s present day ‘hegemonism’ that External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar alluded to, of the sort seen with Taiwan and in the South China Sea? Are the PLA’s moves to occupy land claimed by India, laying down bunkers and rolling in vehicles and equipment tactical—aimed at stopping the Indian Army’s considerable advances on border infrastructure, roads, bridges and landing strips?
It would sound like a cliché to say that India and China share a long and disputed border, are neighbours by geography and are entangled with each other through a long historical and civilizational connection. History and geography are the two prominent catalysts which dictate the direction of this bilateral relationship, a relationship which is very pertinent today for peace and stability in Asia as well as the world. India and China are today strong economic and military powers, and the existing conflicts make the situation highly tense. These are the facts which are known and often repeated.
Bhasin’s much celebrated book Nehru, Tibet and China is an exceptionally enlightening volume because it draws its methodology from basic rules of historiography. Among the numerous books available on the subject over the years and the attention it has garnered recently after the latest clash in Galwan, it is no less than a tremendous feat, that yet another piece has been attempted that not only places the historicity of the context, genesis of the dispute and furnishes a rather honest, at times, stark portrayal of the failure of Nehru’s China policy without the commonplace bitterness from Nehru’s detractors.
It goes without saying that China is India’s most important neighbour and the India-China bilateral relations is the most consequential diplomatic engagement for India in the 21st century. Despite greater attention being paid to China in India recently, there is still not enough research and writing that would stand the test of the time. However, the gap is getting filled with a lot of quality work that has been published recently. Vijay Gokhale, who retired as India’s Foreign Secretary and has had a long engagement with China in various capacities over his diplomatic career, has written the work under review, The Long Game: How the Chinese Negotiate with India.
The rise of a state in international politics is measured by its hard power, soft power, and the effectiveness of its intelligence services. It is surprising that the discussions on the rise of China in the 21st century have often been centered on its hard and soft powers, but barely on the Chinese intelligence mechanisms. The CIA of the United States, KGB of Russia, MI6 of Britain, Mossad of Israel, DGSE of France, Naicho of Japan, and even MJIB of Taiwan, as well as R&AW of India, are well-known names in the world of spying and espionage.
Maroof Raza’s book Contested Lands: India, China and the Boundary Dispute was published in 2021, while the LAC between India and China in Eastern Ladakh was being actively contested. The author has done a diligent job of deep research and logical concatenation of the history of the contest. The subject has already been extremely well covered by many luminaries like Alistair Lamb, Neville Maxwell, Claude Arpi, RS Kalha and Shiv Kunal Verma, to name a few.
The history of West Asia is littered with violent conflicts—interstate wars, civil wars, insurgencies, revolutions, coups, invasions by foreign powers, and ethnic and sectarian strife. After the 1967 war between Israel and a group of Arab nations led by Egypt, peace in the ‘Middle East’ has been elusive. The events in the region constantly seek global attention for a variety of reasons. Divided into eight chapters the book under review seeks to piece together diverse matters into a coherent narrative that helps to make sense of the dynamics of the region—political, religious, military, socio-economic and cultural—that have shaped contemporary alignments and divisions, thus making the region unstable and volatile.
South Asia is witnessing a phase of churning in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. Political volatility combined with economic instability has badly hit the region. As the pandemic seemingly recedes, there is great deal of uncertainty in the entire region straddling India’s periphery. Harsh V Pant’s edited volume Politics and Geopolitics: Decoding India’s Neighbourhood Challenge comes at a cusp moment as nations in South Asia grapple to recover from the shock of the pandemic that claimed millions of lives and ground nations across the region including India to a halt for two years.
Mahatma Gandhi once referred to Sri Lanka as India’s ‘daughter state’. True to this metaphoric observation, India is not only Sri Lanka’s closest, but also an important and powerful neighbour in every aspect: territorial extent, population size, economic strength, military might and diplomatic standing. Relations between the two neighbours stretch to more than two millennia in wide-ranging areas—political, economic, socio-cultural and military. Common colonial experiences under Britain led both countries to have similar world views, yet certain strategic imperatives and national interests dictated differing policies, at times in conflict with each other.
The book under review by Muhammad Azfar Nisar provides important insights into the identity, marginalization and governance of the Khawaja Sira of Pakistan. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Lahore, it studies various forms of governance of the Khawaja Sira community across legal, social and administrative institutions.Muhammad Azfar Nisar is an Assistant Professor of Public Policy & Administration at the Suleman Dawood School of Business, Lahore University of Management Sciences. His research focuses on issues related to policy implementation, public administration, health policy, gender identity, and governance.
The India-Pakistan War of 1965 was the second major war fought between the two countries after Partition in 1947. The War also called the ‘Second Kashmir War’ was a culmination of skirmishes that took place in the preceding months. The seventeen-day War (6 September-22 September 1965) caused thousands of casualties on both sides. The hostilities between the two countries ended after a ceasefire was declared through the United Nations Security Council Resolution, following diplomatic intervention by the Soviet Union and the United States, and the subsequent issuance of the Tashkent Declaration.
India in a New Key—Nehru to Modi: 75 Years of Freedom and Democracy, targeted at a global audience, takes the reader on a journey through the history of India from Independence to the present times. The author, Narain D Batra is puzzled as to why the new-found freedom did not break this huge and diverse country called India and nudge it towards authoritarianism, as was the case with so many other newly independent countries of Asia and Africa. To unpack the mystery of India’s resilience and evolution as a constitutional democracy, he looks in depth into important developments and issues during the tenures of all Prime Ministers from Nehru to Modi.