Predicted to be the world’s third largest economy by 2030, India is navigating a world in which China poses the biggest challenge to its ascent.
This article is the second in a series titled “India: The Next Five Years.” Conversations with subject experts, thought leaders, innovators, strategists, and diplomats will explore India’s foreign relations and its global outlook from 2024 to 2029.
India, the world’s fastest-growing economy, is also growing in its understanding of itself. As it does so, its “grand strategy”—the way it views its place in the world—is largely defined by China, experts say.
“China looms increasingly large in India’s strategic consciousness,” writes Dhruva Jaishankar in his recently released book, “Vishwa Shastra: India and the World.”
“Indeed, China’s rise is likely the primary factor influencing India’s grand strategy today.”
“Vishwa Shastra,” is a Sanskrit phrase that means “treatise on the world.” The book offers a consolidated, linear analysis of Indian foreign policy from ancient to modern times.
Jaishankar, who serves as executive director of the Washington-based Observer Research Foundation, told The Epoch Times in an exclusive interview that there are broadly five objectives to India’s “grand strategy.”
“Strengthening India at home, militarily and economically, is [the] number one priority. [Second is] ensuring a stable neighborhood, which has been a big challenge, but the neighborhood has always, again, been a first priority internationally,” Jaishankar said.
Maintaining a balance of power is India’s third priority. The fourth is to address legacy issues concerning India’s partition, which led to the formation of Pakistan and created larger regional consequences. The fifth is to advocate for India’s adequate participation in global rule-making institutions, he said.
These five objectives have largely defined India’s grand strategy since its independence in 1947. Today’s India has more opportunities and resources to achieve these objectives than it has ever had before, according to Jaishankar.
“India is less on the defensive than in the past. It has more resources than in the past. So that’s good in many respects. It has an ability to modernize. It has an ability to settle some of the issues in its periphery. It has the ability to bypass and isolate Pakistan and things like that.”
