The rise of India and the Indian Ocean

Abstract

Over the past few years, India has placed itself on a path to potentially achieve the regional influence in the Indian Ocean to which it aspires. To this end, New Delhi has raised its profile and strengthened its position in a variety of states on the Indian Ocean littoral, especially Iran, Sri Lanka, Burma, Singapore, Thailand and most of the Ocean's small island states. India has also become a more palpable presence in some of the Ocean's key maritime zones, particularly the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. Of equal or greater importance, India's links with the most important external actors in the Indian Ocean – the United States, Japan, Israel and France – have also been upgraded. These are significant achievements and derive both from India's growing economic clout and the surer hand of contemporary Indian diplomacy. Gaps, of course, remain in India's strategic posture. New Delhi will need to strengthen further its hand in coastal Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. More work will also be required to upgrade India's still somewhat distant relationship with Australia. At the same time, India will need to be more skilful than it has been in cultivating – or ‘compelling’ – better relations and an environment more attuned to its interests in Pakistan and Bangladesh. As India pursues its various goals in the Indian Ocean, much will depend on the performance of the Indian economy and on India's ability to avoid domestic communal discord. Another variable will be the extent to which other states – particularly China and the United States, but also Pakistan and others in southern Asia – are willing or able to offer serious resistance to India's ambitions. The future of political Islam is another wild card. However, barring a halt to globalisation – one of the key mega-trends of the contemporary world – the rise of India in the Indian Ocean is fairly certain. This development will have a transforming effect on the Indian Ocean basin and eventually the world.

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