Why Bharat Matters Chapter 2: Citizen-Centric Criteria for a “Good” Foreign Policy

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Citizen-Centric Criteria for a “Good” Foreign Policy

A foreign policy is “good” only when it tangibly serves individual citizens while securing national interests. In practical terms, it must make everyday needs easier to meet, assure national security, enable aspirations, and deliver concrete dividends—access to technology, capital, best practices, and work opportunities. Effectiveness is therefore judged by four interlocking capabilities: reading global trends early; anticipating implications for India and Indians; responding nimbly to unexpected events; and projecting intentions and image with clarity. The ultimate criterion is less rhetorical elegance than the “smell test”—does it work for ordinary people, especially under stress?

This citizen-centric approach reframes external engagement. It demands institutional mechanisms that can translate state-to-state relationships into protections and benefits for students, professionals, workers, pilgrims, fishermen, and seafarers across diverse geographies. It also requires a style of diplomacy that is pragmatic and multi-vector, expanding options in crises by cultivating relationships not only with major powers but also with regional actors, border authorities, and subnational institutions.

Crisis as the Litmus Test

The most unforgiving yardstick of foreign policy is its performance when Indian lives are at risk abroad. Timely protection, evacuation, and welfare support—delivered at scale—call for three things. First, high-level access and credibility that can unlock corridors, airspace, and facilities on short notice. Second, refined standard operating procedures (SOPs) and a whole-of-government command-and-control capability to choreograph rapid logistics, medical protocols, and legal clearances. Third, the political will to act quickly even amid imperfect information, along with strategic communication that signals intent without escalating risk.

This litmus test extends beyond aircraft and ships. It includes last-mile problem-solving under fire, welfare infrastructures that can gather, test, house, and feed evacuees, and the resilience to sustain operations even when diplomatic premises are compromised. It is here that long-cultivated relationships, flexible multi-engagement, and institutional learning translate into life-saving outcomes.

Operational Practice: Four Evacuations at Scale

Operation Devi Shakti (Kabul, 15 August 2021)

Context. The sudden Taliban takeover left Indians stranded amid fluid checkpoints, an American airbase on edge, desperate crowds, and suspicious fighters. In such ambiguity, delay risked lives.

Response and access. India coordinated access to a tense American airbase, drew on Tajik rear support for quick response, accessed Iranian airspace at short notice, and quietly utilized Gulf facilitation. Seats were secured on flights run by the United States, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, and France through delicate negotiation.

Strategic takeaway. Beyond complex logistics, years of cultivated relationships delivered under pressure. The episode validated a flexible, pragmatic policy of multiple engagements that avoids single-point dependency and widens choices when contingencies cascade.

Operation Ganga (Ukraine, 24 February 2022)

Context. With the outbreak of conflict on 24 February 2022, Indian students and nationals faced dangerous internal travel, congested borders, and risks from shelling and air strikes, including in cities such as Sumy.

Response and deconfliction. The foreign policy apparatus swung into action: facilitating internal transport (trains and buses), intervening at high levels in both Russia and Ukraine to ensure safe passage, and engaging border authorities to enable crossings. In extreme cases, such as Sumy, Indian representatives traversed conflict zones to arrange last-mile logistics.

Regional coordination. Once evacuees exited Ukraine, India coordinated with neighbouring governments—Romania, Poland, Hungary, and Slovakia—to establish transit camps, utilize airfields, and organize return flights.

Strategic takeaway. Multi-level effort “from the very top” showcased preparedness, diplomatic access, and execution capacity under fire, including deconfliction with multiple actors and the orchestration of regional support nodes.

Vande Bharat Mission (COVID-19)

Scale and scope. The Vande Bharat Mission repatriated millions of Indians by air, sea, and land, arguably the largest recorded evacuation exercise in history. It began in Wuhan, extended to Italy, and rapidly diversified global routes.

Operational depth and inclusivity. The visible movement of people rested on an immense welfare infrastructure: organizing rendezvous, testing, housing, and feeding those awaiting repatriation; coordinating clearances; and arranging quarantine. The effort encompassed tourists, students, professionals, workers, pilgrims, fishermen, and seafarers. It also provided support for many who remained abroad—especially in the Gulf—often by interceding with local authorities to protect livelihoods and welfare.

Strategic takeaway. Intensive engagement with local, provincial, and national authorities worldwide, combined with the cumulative credibility built by political leaders and diplomats, enabled mass-scale, humane repatriation that balanced public health, logistics, and international coordination.

Operation Kaveri (Sudan, April 2023)

Context. Armed civil strife in April 2023 rapidly endangered almost 4,000 Indian nationals. Many expatriates were initially reluctant to leave; soon, law and order collapsed and basic necessities became scarce.

Command and assets. A command centre was established at home. Indian aircraft were positioned in Saudi Arabia for short-notice flights, and naval vessels were dispatched to the Red Sea to support maritime evacuation.

On-ground challenges and approach. Indians were dispersed in small numbers across a vast area; the Indian Embassy functioned under extreme duress, including occupation of its premises by a warring party. The operational solution prioritized evacuation that was safe, inconspicuous, and rapid—objectives that frequently collided under personal and political pressures.

Enablers and risks. Partners such as the Saudis, the British, and the Egyptians went out of their way to help. Indian diplomats and military personnel took high personal risks to deliver outcomes.

Strategic takeaway. The operation succeeded owing to committed presence on the ground, adept diplomacy with neighbours and enablers, and a detailed SOP refined over multiple crises—an illustration of institutional learning in action.

Methods, Enablers, and the “Last Mile”

Operational success in these cases rested on a consistent toolkit:

  • High-level interventions and access: deconfliction with Russia and Ukraine; coordination with neighbouring states (Romania, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Saudi Arabia); access to critical airspace (Iranian) and facilities (an American airbase; Gulf facilitation).
  • Forward positioning and mobility: aircraft staged in Saudi Arabia; naval deployments in the Red Sea; establishment of transit camps and use of ad hoc airfields; tactical use of seats on US, UK, UAE, and French flights.
  • Institutional enablers: years of cultivated relationships; flexible multi-vector engagement spanning great powers and regional actors; refined SOPs developed across Wuhan, Italy, Kabul, Ukraine, and Sudan; and a whole-of-government command-and-control capability that can be activated at short notice.
  • Last-mile problem-solving and welfare: representatives physically entering conflict zones like Sumy; comprehensive support architectures to gather, test, house, and feed evacuees; tailored outreach to diverse cohorts (tourists, students, professionals, workers, pilgrims, fishermen, seafarers).

These methods demonstrate that the mechanics of evacuation are inseparable from the politics of access. They also show why strategic communication—communicating intent to citizens, partners, and adversaries—forms part of operational success and the projection of India’s image and credibility.

Strategic Culture, Epic Analogies, and Learning

Classical narratives in India’s civilizational memory offer a grammar for strategic uncertainty. The Ramayana, for instance, illustrates how initial encounters with danger foreshadow greater trials: the sage leading Rama and Lakshmana to cleanse his hermitage of demons is a precursor to more complex tests. Maricha’s later deception as a golden deer—after first being neutralized—reminds us that adversaries adapt. Rama’s pledge to protect the sages of Sharabhanga, the intertwined fates of the monkey-king Vali and the eagle-king Jatayu, and the triggering of King Dasaratha’s boons all underscore how unintended decisions generate unanticipated consequences. Ravana’s abduction of Queen Sita epitomizes the failure to anticipate second- and third-order effects.

Transposed to modern policy practice, these motifs counsel continuous assessment, planning, and readiness—rules, regulations, mechanisms, and practices that are constantly refined. The last decade has seen precisely such refinement: more rigorous SOPs, clearer command chains, and rehearsed inter-agency drills that can translate political direction into protective action for common citizens in turbulent environments.

Policy Implications and Institutional Evolution

Several policy conclusions follow:

  • Citizen-centricity as doctrine. Foreign policy must directly improve safety, mobility, welfare, and opportunity for Indians abroad while sustaining national security and national aspirations. Its legitimacy rests on outcomes that stand up to the “smell test,” even when they lack rhetorical flourish.
  • Institutionalization over improvisation. Detailed SOPs, crisis command structures, and inter-agency coordination mechanisms need to be built, exercised, and iteratively improved based on lived experience across theatres—from Wuhan and Italy to Kabul, Ukraine, and Sudan.
  • Multi-engagement pragmatism. Flexible relations with multiple partners—great powers and regional actors alike—expand options, open routes and facilities, and reduce single-point dependencies. The ability to work simultaneously with the US, UK, UAE, France, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Tajikistan, Iran (for airspace), and European neighbours like Romania, Poland, Hungary, and Slovakia is a force multiplier.
  • Strategic communication and image projection. Credible, responsive action that secures citizens while engaging partners enhances India’s reputation, signaling reliability and capability.
  • A step-change in capacity. The past decade reflects measurable improvement in India’s ability to anticipate, respond, and deliver for citizens, evidenced by operations such as Operation Ganga, Operation Devi Shakti, the Vande Bharat Mission, and Operation Kaveri.

The cumulative takeaway is straightforward: when oriented around citizens and backed by refined institutions, diverse partnerships, and agile execution, India’s foreign policy makes a concrete difference in daily life while reinforcing national credibility—especially when it matters most.

Globalization’s Immediacy: Lessons from COVID-19

India’s pandemic management underscored how intimately external developments shape domestic outcomes. During the first wave in 2020, as the world scrambled for personal protective equipment, masks, and ventilators, India was compelled to procure critical supplies in a stark seller’s market where demand dwarfed available stock. Inputs indispensable to the pharmaceutical sector—active pharmaceutical ingredients, reagents, filters, glass vials, and cold-chain equipment—suddenly acquired strategic salience. The vaccine ecosystem, assembled at speed, drew on components from dozens of firms across multiple jurisdictions, each subject to local priorities and export controls. Commerce proved necessary but not sufficient: access hinged on diplomatic relationships that could secure regulatory clearances, broker exceptions to export restrictions, and coordinate logistics. Indian missions overseas, working with an inter-ministerial apparatus at home, functioned as procurement nodes as much as political outposts.

The second wave in 2021 further accentuated this interdependence. Acute and immediate needs for liquid medical oxygen, cryogenic tankers, concentrators, and specialized therapeutics required rapid identification of suppliers, negotiation of terms, contracting, and expedited air- and sea-bridge arrangements. Indian diplomacy, mobilized at scale, delivered partnerships and permissions that corporate contracting alone could not guarantee within the timeframes dictated by a public health emergency. Crises of this magnitude illuminate a durable truth: the rhythms of daily life in India—health, availability of essentials, and the resilience of basic services—are increasingly contingent on events and decisions beyond national borders.

Foreign Policy as a Public Good in Everyday Life

Given the proximity of the external to the internal, foreign policy warrants serious public attention. External engagements—state visits, negotiations on sensitive bilateral relationships, or debates on overseas interests—bear directly on security, employment, quality of life, and even personal health. They also shape intangible assets such as national pride, values, reputation, and image. Treating foreign policy as a distant elite discourse misses its character as a public good that underwrites individual wellbeing.

The lived face of foreign policy is tangible across social strata:
– Students encounter it in visa regimes, the ability to travel during disruptions like COVID-19, and post-study work prospects shaped by bilateral understandings and mutual recognition of qualifications.
– Businesspeople rely on it for market access, clarity on foreign regulations and standards, and government-to-government problem-solving when routine channels stall.
– Professionals and workers abroad benefit from negotiated protections, fair contract norms, grievance redress, and welfare mechanisms—especially in episodic downturns or crises.
– Tourists and travelers discover its immediacy when embassies and consulates provide succour, documentation, and, when necessary, evacuation. Consular diplomacy is often a citizen’s first experience of the state beyond India’s borders.

Diplomacy, Security, and Risk Management at Home

Foreign policy also advances domestic security. As a preventive tool, it builds shared understandings of threats that reduce escalation risks. As a mitigator, it knits together coalitions for intelligence sharing, counter-terror finance, cyber defense, and maritime domain awareness. As a problem solver, it generates crisis hotlines, deconfliction arrangements, and confidence-building measures along contested frontiers. For soldiers at the Line of Actual Control and Line of Control, and for policemen confronting terrorism and radicalization, effective diplomacy expands the margin of safety by softening the environment in which they operate—limiting adversarial support networks, constraining illicit flows, and creating international costs for malign behavior. These are not abstractions: they are practical enablers of operational success and risk reduction.

Economic Statecraft, Supply Chains, and Household Welfare

In an era of deep interdependence, economic statecraft sits at the heart of national security. Strategic relationships attract investment, ease technology access, and diffuse best practices that cumulatively accelerate India’s growth, expand employment, and improve quality of life. The effects are visible in quotidian ways: the price of imported cooking oil at a neighborhood store tracks developments in Southeast Asian plantations and Black Sea ports; the availability and affordability of a smartphone assembled in India reflects tariff policy, production-linked incentives, and cross-border flows of components and intellectual property. Policy choices on standards, data, and competition reverberate through household budgets.

The Ukraine conflict crystallized these linkages. Energy and commodity markets whipsawed, shipping routes were disrupted, and fertiliser and grain supplies tightened, revealing the fragility of global supply chains to geopolitical shocks. India’s policy responses—diversifying energy sources, calibrating export controls, managing inflation, and securing alternative logistics—demonstrated that macroeconomic stability is now inseparable from diplomatic agility. The lesson is distributive: price stability for consumers and input certainty for producers are both functions of external positioning as much as domestic management.

Voice, Perception, and Influence in Transnational Challenges

Three transnational challenges—pandemics, terrorism, and climate change—reach deeply into individual existence. They raise a normative question central to India’s strategic culture: should India seek a greater say in shaping global rules commensurate with the scale of their domestic impact? A credible answer requires both capacity and voice. It also requires leveraging multiple platforms—from the United Nations to plurilateral settings and issue-specific coalitions—to translate national priorities into international norms and financing pathways.

Perceptions are force multipliers or constraints in this endeavor. What others think of India—its competence, culture, and way of life—carries material consequences for investment, technology partnerships, tourism, and the global appetite to align with Indian initiatives. India’s G20 presidency offered a rare opportunity to familiarize the world with India’s developmental choices and capacities, while encouraging Indians to explore overseas opportunities within a more receptive environment. Managing perception, however, is inseparable from defending agency. Shaping the narrative must go hand-in-hand with insulating national debates and development choices from external interference—whether via disinformation, coercive market practices, extraterritorial activism, or politicized conditionalities.

Ultimately, the attitudes, perceptions, and interests of others are inseparable from India’s outcomes. Securing wellbeing, prosperity, and strategic autonomy in an interconnected world demands a sharper domestic realization that foreign policy matters—not episodically, but as an everyday underpinning of national security and societal resilience.

Diplomacy and National Security

National security stands at the apex of societal priorities. It shapes territorial integrity, public safety, law and order, and the collective well-being, which together sustain national spirit and even the very existence of the state. For India, this imperative is sharpened by disproportionate external security challenges arising from unsettled boundaries that generate persistent contestations. These require determination, resources, and the attainment of optimal ground positions; they also demand effective negotiations and a constant premium on maintaining peace and tranquillity along sensitive frontiers. In this setting, diplomacy and defence are intrinsically linked. Diplomacy is the first line of engagement, but it also serves as the essential back-up to military power, because most situations of force and deterrence ultimately find closure at a negotiating table—if they are to be resolved in a manner that is sustainable and minimally disruptive to development.

A prudent strategic culture is wary of simple assumptions about convergence or rational self-interest guiding others’ behavior. Ambitions, emotions, and risk-taking propensities can be volatile, as the unexpectedly sharp downturn in India–China relations over the last three years illustrates. Stabilizing the neighborhood through foreign policy achievements thus becomes an enabling condition for domestic progress: it reduces the risks of external destabilization, expands policy bandwidth for economic transformation, and aligns the security environment with developmental priorities. Prudence also requires that posture be backed by capabilities and credible deterrence, thereby widening options for crisis response and steadying the management of escalation.

Within this framework, Indian diplomacy carries three central responsibilities. First, it must maximize strategic options during contingencies—by acquiring defence equipment and supportive measures, by securing international understanding for India’s policies and actions, and by sustaining engagement that mitigates or resolves fraught situations. Second, it must work to secure optimal positions both on the ground and at the negotiating table, knitting together peace and tranquillity with preparedness for adverse scenarios. Third, it functions as both shield and sword in the political realm: it advances reasoned argumentation to build legitimacy and trust, and it delivers robust rebuttals to polemics and hostile narratives that seek to erode India’s security or standing.

Practice and Precedent: East, West, and the Northern Front

The consolidation of India’s eastern flank underscores how diplomatic resolution of legacy disputes can unlock security dividends and wider regional cooperation. The conclusion and implementation of the Land Boundary Agreement with Bangladesh in 2015, combined with the resolution of maritime differences, transformed a complex boundary management problem into a platform for stability. Security improved tangibly in the East, reducing cross-border frictions and facilitating law-and-order cooperation. Just as importantly, the settlement enabled broader economic cooperation and connectivity across the sub-region. India and Bangladesh have benefited from enhanced trade and travel; Nepal and Bhutan have gained from similar connectivity improvements; and the northeastern states of India have been empowered to deepen their economic integration with proximate markets. The security payoff of such neighbourhood stabilization is both direct and indirect: fewer sanctuaries for illicit flows, more predictable border management, and greater policy space for development in frontier areas.

On the western boundary with Pakistan, the initial diplomatic objective in recent years was to expose and de-legitimize cross-border terrorism. By systematically building international awareness of the nature of this challenge, India’s diplomacy created a normative and political environment less tolerant of denial and obfuscation. When counter-actions became necessary—specifically after the Uri attack in 2016 and the Balakot strike in 2019—effective diplomatic outreach ensured global understanding and acceptance of India’s responses. This reflected a larger lesson: that the efficacy of kinetic measures is shaped not only by their operational success but also by the diplomatic context that frames their rationale, limits escalation, and consolidates strategic gains.

Since May 2020, the stand-off with China along the Line of Actual Control has highlighted the joining-at-the-hip of foreign and defence policies. Parallel diplomatic negotiations—conducted at multiple levels and in tandem with measured military deployments—have been central to crisis management. Here, the task has been to secure optimal ground positions consistent with deterrence and readiness, while ensuring that talks remain structured, purposeful, and resilient. The broader international environment has mattered: global support and appreciation for India’s approach have reinforced both negotiating leverage and the sustainability of a calibrated posture. This episode is a reminder that forecasting the choices of major powers in periods of transition is inherently uncertain and that stability along contested frontiers requires persistent statecraft, crisis communication, and the continuous knitting together of military prudence and diplomatic resolve.

Capability Building and Multipolar Leverage

India’s strategic autonomy is strengthened by the ability to tap a multipolar world for critical capabilities across parallel timeframes. The recent acquisition profile illustrates both diversity and nimbleness: Rafale aircraft from France, MH-60 helicopters and P-8 maritime patrol aircraft from the United States, the S-400 missile system from Russia, and precision munitions such as SPICE bombs from Israel. These procurements have been complemented by intensive military exercises and policy exchanges that deepen interoperability, build trust with multiple partners, and create greater strategic comfort. The result is a widening of India’s operational options in contingencies and an ability to tailor deterrence across domains and theatres. Diplomacy has been integral throughout—assembling coalitions of support for technology access, navigating regulatory and political hurdles, and sequencing acquisitions so that they are mutually reinforcing rather than path-dependent.

Internal Security Linkages and the External Dimension

India’s internal security record—particularly in border-adjacent regions—has long been affected by actors operating from neighboring territories. Effective diplomacy has helped to discourage external shelter and support for insurgents and criminal networks by aligning incentives, tightening legal cooperation, and elevating the costs of permissive behavior. Where necessary, these efforts have been accompanied by more proactive measures, persuasively justified in international forums to achieve specific outcomes. The pursuit of peace at home is therefore inseparable from calibrated external engagement: constraining sanctuaries, reducing cross-border enablers, and encouraging neighbors to harmonize their practices with India’s security imperatives. Over time, such diplomacy builds a thicker fabric of cooperation—on border infrastructure, information sharing, and joint enforcement—that makes recidivism harder and stability more durable.

Transnational Extremism, Information Warfare, and Narrative Contestation

The globalization of political mobilization has introduced new vectors of risk. Separatism, violence, and fundamentalism have been propagated from distant destinations that sometimes misuse free speech protections to provide cover for intimidation or incitement. Canada and the United Kingdom have been cited as locations where such activities have occurred, requiring sustained and vigorous countering by Indian diplomacy. Where arguments and persuasion fail, firmer diplomatic measures may be necessary; India’s posture now conveys that it will not be a punching bag in the politics of others. In a world of borderless politics and influence operations, powerful forces with distinct agendas often seek to override democratic choices—by delegitimizing alternative viewpoints, leveraging the power of digital platforms, and working through the influence of civil society organizations in ways that blur lines between advocacy and interference.

The battle of narratives is therefore continuous. Arguments should be met with reason, but polemics—particularly those that enable extremism or magnify governance challenges—require more vehement replies. The problem is compounded when sympathetic interlocutors amplify such narratives in the name of civil society or identity politics. There have been instances of established newspapers offering opinion-page platforms to individuals under UN sanctions, and of eminent broadcasters engaging in political hatchet jobs that blur analysis and activism. These episodes reflect both a mindset and an objective: to delegitimize India’s perspectives and to erode the cohesion that underpins national security. The appropriate response is patient but persistent—demonstrating that the pursuit of India’s national interest aligns with advocacy of the global good, and relying on clear argumentation and effective communication to defend against disinformation while advancing a credible, evidence-based narrative.

These contests carry direct security implications. Misrepresentations in global debates can undermine efforts to strengthen national unity, sovereignty, and integrity in a federal polity of extraordinary diversity. Improvements in governance, the application of technology to service delivery, and the resolution of long-festering issues are sometimes depicted as detrimental to freedom. Prominent institutions can, at times, indulge in disinformation, airbrush history, or ignore inconvenient events to promote specific causes. Political votebanks now also exist beyond India’s shores, shaping foreign perceptions and discourse in ways that may not align with India’s democratic mandate or security needs. Recognizing these dynamics is essential to designing effective diplomatic engagement that protects domestic consensus-building from external manipulation.

Policy Takeaways for Indian Diplomacy

  • Robust defence against undermining efforts is a necessary commitment, not an optional stance. The challenge is not a theoretical debate but a harsh reality rooted both in ideological opposition to India’s choices and in the competitive nature of international relations.

  • Persistent interests have historically militated against a strong and united India by exploiting social faultlines—religion, language, ethnicity, and social strata. These practices continue today under new guises and arguments, amplified by digital technologies and transnational networks.

  • Indian foreign policy must push back strongly against external support for separatism, the underplaying or rationalization of terrorism directed at India, and the readiness of some foreign forums to denigrate India’s record and achievements. This pushback should be paired with a compelling and consistent national narrative that makes the case for India’s policies, clarifies intent, and builds coalitions of understanding.

  • The integration of diplomacy with defence—maximizing options in crises, securing optimal ground and negotiating positions, and cultivating a diversified capability base—should remain a core operating principle. In practice, this means sustained investment in deterrence, constant attention to peace and tranquillity along sensitive borders, and an agile diplomatic toolkit calibrated to a multipolar environment.

Development-Centric Diplomacy and National Competitiveness

Foreign policy is not an adjunct to development; it is an accelerator of it. For a late-industrializing democracy with continental-scale needs, diplomacy must be organized around trade, investment, technology acquisition, and market access. The yardstick is not abstract internationalism but outcomes that enhance competitiveness, create employment, and diffuse capability. Domestic capacity-building—skills, infrastructure, finance, and institutions—is essential, yet it does not suffice without purposeful external engagement that supplies information, networks, access, capital, and best practices. When executed well, a virtuous cycle emerges: overseas economic activity deepens domestic skills and supply-chain sophistication, which in turn raises export performance and strengthens national resilience.

This orientation situates India within a broader arc of Asian modernization. Japan’s Meiji state and China after Deng Xiaoping demonstrate that latecomers cannot rely on markets to self-correct in their favor; they must marshal external linkages to internal learning. India’s contemporary approach draws on these lessons while correcting the excesses of earlier globalization cycles—leveraging international collaboration to hasten development while avoiding dependencies that erode strategic autonomy.

Lessons from Late Industrializers: History, Diagnostics, and Conceptual Clarity

India’s liberalization three decades ago delivered undisputed benefits, but the pursuit of efficiency often chose easy options. Small and medium enterprises were squeezed; domestic supply-chain depth was neglected; infrastructure projects were outsourced in ways that minimized local learning. The result was growth that did not proportionately scale skills and capabilities. In the last decade, strategic reassessment has challenged the mantras of frictionless globalization. Economic choices detached from geopolitical context can normalize dependency as “global thinking,” entrench strategic lock-ins, and hollow out industrial commons.

This corrective lens reframes several debates. The central policy choice is not between an open and a protected economy. It is whether the state steers towards an employment-centric, capability-driven model or defaults to a profit-obsessed, market-only orientation that undervalues learning and resilience. Real growth is not reducible to GDP increments; it requires the painstaking construction of infrastructure, supply chains, skills, finance, and social mobility. In this schema, foreign policy is both driver and insurance—propelling trade and technology access while ensuring that development trajectories remain aligned with a prudent big-picture strategy.

Instruments and Mechanisms: From Market Access to Capability Accrual

  • Foreign commercial policy as competitiveness strategy: Negotiated market access, tariff and non-tariff barrier reduction, and regulatory convergence are instruments to embed Indian firms in global supply chains. Free-trade agreements and other negotiated understandings must be paced and sequenced to secure export growth and learning effects, not mere headline openness.

  • Diplomacy as an enabler across domains: Missions must identify, engage, and leverage opportunities in trade, technology partnerships, education, and tourism. The goal is translation—turning external interactions into domestic capability accrual, particularly through joint ventures, co-development, standards partnerships, and talent pipelines.

  • Connectivity and socio-economic collaboration as influence multipliers: In an era of dense interdependence and interpenetration, connectivity—physical, digital, financial, and energy—expands India’s zones of deep influence. These socio-economic linkages complement traditional instruments (trade, finance, military activity, migration), align regional prosperity with Indian security, and create constituencies for stability in the neighborhood and beyond.

Evidence from Recent Practice and Emerging Domains

Despite a difficult global environment in the wake of the Covid pandemic, India has met ambitious export targets, underpinned by reforms in manufacturing, labour, finance, skills, and trade facilitation. Steady improvements in the ease of doing business, logistics, and customs processes have lowered transaction costs, while production-linked incentives and standards harmonization have encouraged scale.

Foreign collaboration has visibly lifted capacities across sectors: in information technology through global delivery models and R&D centers; in automobiles via platform sharing and vendor development; in food production and processing through cold chains and quality norms; in urban infrastructure ranging from metros to the bullet train; and in strategic domains such as space and nuclear energy where partnerships have catalyzed both national projects and enterprise-level innovation. These engagements demonstrate that external partnerships can be structured to generate domestic learning curves rather than perpetual dependence.

New frontiers—especially green growth and climate action—open further avenues for cooperation. From renewable integration and battery storage to green hydrogen, carbon markets, and climate-resilient agriculture, the partner universe spans long-industrialized economies and newer innovation hubs. The imperative is to negotiate arrangements that internalize technology and standards while creating domestic manufacturing and services ecosystems around the green transition.

Regional Connectivity and the Neighbourhood as Strategic Multiplier

Partition constrained India’s natural regional reach. Contemporary policy seeks to invert that structural handicap by making Indian prosperity a regional incentive that deepens interdependence to the benefit of South Asia as a whole. The Neighbourhood First outlook operationalizes this vision at close quarters, while parallel policies extend it to the wider neighborhood.

The results are tangible: new and revived road and rail links; inland waterways and coastal shipping arrangements; port access and transit rights; power grids and cross-border fuel flows; and greater movement of students, tourists, and professionals. The Covid period highlighted how timely support and cooperative health and logistics arrangements can buttress regional trust. The emphasis on win-win outcomes and partner buy-ins is gradually transforming the subregion—anchoring practical cooperation in transport, energy, and people-to-people ties that underwrite durable stability and growth. In strategic terms, these interlocking economic interests expand zones of deep influence, reducing the space for destabilizing external penetration.

Managing Interdependence: Risks, Cautions, and Strategic Insurance

Interdependence is a source of leverage but also exposure. When global norms are disregarded or selectively interpreted, supply chains can be weaponized and market access politicized. Competitive polities will not always play by the rules; hence exposure requires constant monitoring, stress-testing, and diversification. Diplomacy, therefore, must be the voice of caution as much as the facilitator of opportunity—systematically informing policy and society of risks, pitfalls, and contingencies.

The most insidious risk is a comfortable dependency founded on imported efficiencies that displace domestic learning. Overreliance on turnkey solutions, captive vendor models, or technology black-boxes can undermine employment, stall capability formation, and constrain strategic options through lock-ins. A development-first foreign policy must, therefore, couple external acceleration with the sustained nurturing of internal strengths—absorbing technologies, developing standards competence, and cultivating supplier depth, especially among SMEs.

Policy Directions and Causal Pathways

Policy directions:
– Sustain reform momentum in manufacturing, labour, finance, skills, and trade facilitation, while continuously improving logistics and the ease of doing business to anchor export growth.
– Pair negotiated market access—FTAs, standards cooperation, and supply-chain integration—with deliberate domestic capability development, particularly SME upgrading and supply-chain depth, to ensure robust learning and resilience.
– Prioritize sectors with multiplier effects—IT and digital services, advanced manufacturing, infrastructure, space, nuclear energy, and green technologies—structuring partnerships to internalize know-how and expand domestic value-add.
– Expand connectivity and socio-economic collaboration under Neighbourhood First and extended-neighbourhood initiatives, aligning regional integration with security objectives and creating mutually beneficial interdependence.
– Institutionalize risk assessment within foreign policy: anticipate norm violations, competitive pressures, and supply-chain vulnerabilities through whole-of-government mechanisms linking economics, technology, security, and regulation.

Causal flows:
– Encouragement and facilitation of trade and investment raise exports, which feed back into domestic capability-building through stronger skills, employment, and competitiveness.
– Negotiated market access and barrier reduction speed insertion into global value chains; when paired with internal learning, they enhance long-term strategic autonomy rather than compromise it.
– Connectivity and collaboration projects with neighbors create interlocking interests that stabilize the region and amplify India’s influence, reinforcing national development.
– Conversely, reliance on rapid, externally sourced efficiencies without domestic absorption reduces learning, harms SMEs, and produces growth without capability formation—culminating in strategic vulnerability.

Taken together, these directions define a calibrated, development-first diplomacy that mobilizes trade, technology, capital, and connectivity while safeguarding autonomy through capability-building at home. In an era of dense interdependence, such a balanced approach privileges employment, learning, and resilience over short-term profit, aligning foreign policy with the imperatives of strategic culture and national security.

Accessing a Global Workplace

Harnessing Human Capital through Domestic Reform

India’s access to the global workplace begins with the transformation of its domestic foundations. The post-2014 period saw a deliberate alignment of socio-economic campaigns with foreign policy objectives, aiming to convert a vast but historically underutilized human resource base into a competitive advantage. National initiatives addressing gender discrimination, health, education, skills, and employment were supplemented by an expanded conception of basic necessities—affordable housing, reliable power, piped water, and accessible healthcare—shifting the baseline of capability for millions. Concurrently, infrastructure expansion, manufacturing push, smart cities, and new labour codes sought to modernize the economy’s hardware and software alike, recalibrating incentives for formalization, mobility, and productivity.

This domestic reset altered the cause-effect equation of external engagement. Social inclusion and skill-building (cause) improved the competitiveness and confidence of Indian workers (mechanism), thereby enhancing their prospects in global labour markets (effect). The net result is a more credible promise of the demographic dividend: a large, increasingly skilled, English-proficient, and globally minded workforce ready to meet international demand, just as many developed economies confront shrinking working-age populations.

From Self-Driven Mobility to Policy-Enabled Access

Historically, Indian mobility was entrepreneurial and self-driven. The current phase adds policy scaffolding to remove frictions and to maximize welfare. Two developments are pivotal.

First, domestic facilitation of movement. The expansion of passport application centers to four times their earlier footprint and simplified verification procedures produced a sea change in ease of travel, with Post Office-based services and digital processes turning passports into a near-ubiquitous document of mobility. This internal plumbing of mobility is not incidental; it is the foundation for accessing opportunity abroad.

Second, the internationalization of mobility frameworks. India has negotiated migration and mobility partnerships with Portugal, the United Kingdom, Australia, France, Germany, and Italy, while similar arrangements are widening across Europe. These instruments aim to translate demographic complementarities into structured pathways for students, researchers, professionals, and skilled workers. Employment outcomes for Indian students in the United States, Canada, Australia, and Europe feature prominently in bilateral agendas; visa regimes, post-study work opportunities, and recognition of credentials are no longer peripheral issues but central to foreign policy. India’s stance emphasizes nondiscriminatory treatment of talent in the US, Canada, Oceania, and Europe, with diplomacy focused on predictable, transparent, and fair access to labour markets amid shifting political debates in host countries.

Skill mobility has also been negotiated with key partners where demand is acute. With Japan, bilateral arrangements underpin the Technical Intern Training Program and Specified Skilled Worker tracks. With Europe, the Gulf, and Russia, tailored opportunities target sectors from healthcare and construction to IT and maritime services. These frameworks convert episodic flows into systematic pipelines, with pre-departure orientation, language training, and skill certification increasingly embedded to protect workers and improve outcomes.

Welfare, Rights, and Resilience for Indians Overseas

As outward mobility intensifies, welfare is treated as a core sovereign responsibility. The Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) has been used liberally to support citizens in distress—from legal aid and shelter to emergency repatriation—especially in the Gulf, where the largest concentration of Indian workers resides. Job training programs, grievance redressal, and consular outreach have been complemented by sector-specific protections: a notable example is the rights-of-domestic-workers agreement with Kuwait. Efforts to recover social security contributions made abroad and to negotiate portability arrangements underscore a wider shift from transactional protection to structural safeguarding.

Visa facilitation has become a central diplomatic objective, recognizing that the first barrier to welfare and opportunity is often bureaucratic. At home, e-migrate systems, pre-departure orientation modules, and insurance schemes add a layer of resilience for workers. During Covid-19, the Vande Bharat Mission’s repatriation of millions of Indians—workers, students, seafarers, and tourists—demonstrated state capability and commitment under duress. That episode built trust in the proposition that mobility is not abandonment: the state will stand by its citizens abroad.

This cumulative architecture has clear causality. Easier passports and visas (cause) joined to skill mobility pacts (cause) yield smoother and safer movement (mechanism), broadening access to global opportunities while embedding welfare safeguards (effect). Over time, these measures contribute to a more confident mobility culture, where risk is better managed, and returns—both individual and national—are greater.

Diaspora Power as a Strategic Multiplier

India’s diaspora is the largest in the world, layered by historical indenture and trade, post-1960s professional migration, and contemporary outflows. Unlike many diasporas created by domestic turmoil, India’s was not upheaval-driven; this distinction, combined with sustained democratic continuity, has anchored a distinctive emotional bond with the home country. That bond has been visibly renewed in the last decade, with the 2014 Madison Square Garden event often cited as a symbolic inauguration of a more confident, participatory relationship between the state and overseas communities.

As India’s global standing rises, diaspora communities benefit from association and, reciprocally, serve as bridges—amplifying influence, mobilizing investment and technology, shaping narratives, and opening markets. The government has expanded the repertoire of connection: structured community engagement by missions, support during crises, cultural diplomacy, and recognition of overseas achievements signal that the diaspora is not a marginal constituency but integral to foreign policy.

The strategic pay-off is twofold. Proactive engagement and welfare measures (cause) strengthen diaspora bonds and support networks (effect). These networks, in turn, deepen India’s soft power and policy leverage in host societies (strategic outcome). In an era defined by contested information spaces and coalition politics, such assets can be decisive.

Shaping Responses to Transnational Threats

Bread-and-butter issues—jobs, visas, remittances—are necessary but insufficient for a credible external policy. Large states are judged by their handling of transnational challenges and by their ability to shape global norms. India’s approach to pandemics, terrorism, and climate change illustrates the interplay of responsibility and influence.

On terrorism, sustained diplomacy has contributed to sharper global awareness and lower tolerance for state sponsorship and safe havens. Through multilateral forums and operational cooperation, India has repeatedly foregrounded accountability, financial flows (including black money), and cross-border linkages, moving debates from abstraction to enforcement.

On climate change, India’s role was pivotal in forging the 2015 Paris consensus and in ensuring that developmental equity, energy access, and differentiated responsibilities remained embedded in the framework. At Glasgow in 2021, India raised ambition—articulating the “Panchamrit,” including net zero by 2070—while concurrently building coalitions for practical action. The International Solar Alliance (ISA) and the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) are signature platforms that convert normative leadership into institutionalized cooperation, particularly benefiting the Global South.

During the pandemic, India’s internationalism was expressed through the supply of essential medicines, vaccines, and the deployment of medical teams abroad. This delivery-first posture underscored a broader ethos: responsible powers contribute to global public goods even while managing domestic stress. Visible crisis responses (cause) generate appreciation and trust (effect), reinforcing India’s reputation as reliable partner and first responder (strategic outcome).

Outreach, Convening Power, and the National Persona

Indian diplomacy over the past decade has been marked by an intensified tempo and broadened canvas. High-frequency bilateral visits, active participation in collective summits, expanded development partnerships, and the opening of new embassies illustrate a sustained push to widen access and influence. The personalization of diplomacy—through high-visibility leader-level engagements—has amplified signals and accelerated outcomes.

A series of milestones captures the change in convening power. Ten ASEAN leaders attended India’s Republic Day in 2018; five Central Asian leaders joined the event virtually in 2022; all 27 leaders of the European Union engaged India together in 2021; and 41 African leaders participated in the India–Africa Forum Summit of 2015. India’s G20 presidency during a period of acute geopolitical polarization validated a multi-partner engagement strategy and explicitly foregrounded the concerns of the Global South, including through dedicated summits and development-focused deliverables.

These diplomatic investments have reinforced a composite national persona: first responder in crises, pharmacy of the world in healthcare, reservoir of talent in technology and services, climate action leader through solar and resilience platforms, development partner across Asia, Africa, and the Pacific, and cultural powerhouse rooted in democracy, innovation, yoga, millets, and Ayurveda. The cumulative effect is to align identity with capability, thereby making partnership choices easier for counterparts and strengthening domestic confidence that citizen concerns are addressed abroad.

Strategic Logic and Policy Implications

India’s strategy for accessing a global workplace rests on a clear cause-effect logic:

  • Domestic reforms since 2014 (cause) improved skills, infrastructure, and social inclusion (mechanism), raising the competitiveness of Indians in global labour markets (effect).
  • Demographic constraints in developed economies (cause), combined with India’s skilled workforce (cause), increased demand for Indian talent (effect), formalized through migration and mobility partnerships (mechanism).
  • Easier passports and visa facilitation (cause), together with negotiated skill-mobility frameworks (cause), produced smoother, safer mobility (mechanism), widening opportunity while embedding welfare safeguards (effect).
  • Proactive diaspora engagement (cause) created stronger bonds and networks (effect), translating into soft power and policy leverage (strategic outcome).
  • Leadership on terrorism, climate, and pandemics (cause) yielded recognition as a responsible actor (effect), expanding agenda-setting capacity and coalition-building potential (strategic effect).
  • High-visibility crisis response—Vande Bharat Mission, disaster relief, Covid assistance—(cause) built reputational capital (effect), deepening partnerships (strategic outcome).

Three implications follow for policy and diplomacy.

First, foreign policy must continue to integrate labour mobility, student outcomes, and diaspora welfare as central pillars. Formal mobility frameworks, welfare funds like the ICWF, social security portability, and pre-departure protections are not ancillary instruments; they are essential to convert human capital into strategic influence and sustained economic gain.

Second, leadership on transnational challenges requires delivery platforms. ISA and CDRI exemplify a preference for institution-building over abstract advocacy. Similar approaches—on digital public infrastructure, resilient supply chains, and health security—can consolidate India’s status as a provider of global public goods, especially for the Global South.

Third, synergy between domestic capability-building and external engagement must remain the guiding principle. Skills, infrastructure, and access to services at home complement mobility partnerships and diplomatic activism abroad, producing a virtuous cycle of credibility, access, and influence. As Bharat marks 75 years of independence, recognizing the centrality of foreign policy to national prospects—and the risks and opportunities in a globalized, multipolar era—will be vital to sustain India’s role in the global workplace and to underpin a broader rebalancing of international power.