Why India must find ways to be visible on the Middle East crisis |
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Why India must find ways to be visible on the Middle East crisis
If New Delhi seeks to move beyond being a voice of the Global South to becoming a consequential global actor, then moments of crisis are not interruptions; they are tests.
With a fragile ceasefire in Middle East and shifting geopolitical currents worldwide, a difficult question has surfaced in strategic circles: has India done enough—or has it chosen to do too little?
The issue is not about diplomatic theatrics. It is about India’s evolving global stature. If New Delhi seeks to move beyond being a voice of the Global South to becoming a consequential global actor, then moments of crisis are not interruptions; they are tests. And in this test, India’s conspicuous absence from the diplomatic choreography has raised uncomfortable questions.
Today, India maintains working relationships with all principal actors—Washington, Tehran, and Tel Aviv. Yet, as negotiations unfolded and backchannels activated, it was Pakistan, and not India, that found itself in the room. This inversion of expectations has triggered a deeper debate: has India’s self-imposed caution ceded strategic space?
There is, to be fair, a strong defence of India’s approach. India’s interests in Middle East are complex and deeply material. Energy security remains paramount. The region supplies a substantial share of India’s oil and gas, underpins fertiliser availability, and hosts a vast diaspora whose remittances are critical to the economy. Maritime stability in the Gulf is not an abstraction; it is to some extent an economic lifeline.
In such a context, risk aversion is not weakness; it is prudence. India has, over the past decade, invested heavily in bilateral relationships across the region, carefully de-hyphenating........