India is in an excellent position to play a vital role in winding up the Russia-Ukraine war as it hosts the G20 Foreign Ministers meeting attended by the West and Russia. However, India is trying to brush it under the carpet and is pushing to prevent the subject of the Russia-Ukraine war from taking the central stage. Since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war, New Delhi has opted for a neutral stance on the matter as India’s neutrality rather has a strong proclivity. The United States President Joe Biden has expressed India’s response to the Russia-Ukraine conflict as ‘somewhat shaky’. Since January 2022, India at the UN Security Council, General Assembly, and Human Rights Council have abstained from votes and draft resolutions deploring Russian aggression in Ukraine. This act of so-called neutrality by India was beckoning for diplomatic flurry by the West. These interactions established that India was the only weak link in QUAD, who abstained from condemning Russian aggression against Ukraine. Despite intensifying diplomatic pressure on New Delhi, it has not budged from its position. The underlying causes could be examined by analysing India’s perpetual cosiness with Russia and distantness from Ukraine.
The diplomatic pressures from the West have placed India in a dilemma. Despite the tensions, India was bound not to vote against Russia due to its historical reliance on Russia’s diplomatic, strategic, and economic relations. The Soviet Union, on several occasions, has exercised its veto power to protect India, such as human rights violations in Kashmir, the 1971 war with Pakistan, India’s invasion of Goa etc. In return, India has abstained from votes that condemned the Soviet 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia and the 1989 invasion of Afghanistan. In her podcast with Foreign Policy Magazine, Suhasini Haidar accentuated New Delhi’s historical strategic and economic relations with Moscow. She asserted that India’s defence hardware dependency on Russia ranged around 60% while spare parts dependency was as high as 85%. Additionally, Russia was a primary source of technology transfers for its ‘make in India’ initiative and foreign defence partnerships such as the BrahMos program. She also cited that it was ‘worth remembering’ that India invested $16 billion in Russian oil. Her primary focus was that India’s future interests would not benefit from the dollar vs non-dollar economic system. Several western leaders have called out India’s continuous dependence on Russian oil. Indian External Affairs Minister has addressed such comments by stating that purchasing discounted oil from Russia is economically and strategically advantageous for the country. These arguments could be the bedrock of Indian foreign policy to sustain its neutral position and dodge the camp trap. However, it seemed relatively straightforward that India’s so-called neutrality was partisan. This could be further scrutinised by evaluating India’s relations with Ukraine.
The recent turn of events has proved to be a litmus test for Ukraine-India relations. While Ukraine and India profited from economic ties, many analysts have contended that the so-called neutral stance by India has a chronicle of Indian grievances against Ukraine. The gradient of grievances included Ukraine’s stance on Jammu and Kashmir, its response to India’s nuclear test, and the sale of weapons to Pakistan. The matter of Jammu and Kashmir since 1948, Ukraine (then Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic) supported the resolution of the Jammu and Kashmir dispute. This stance supported Pakistan’s take on the subject while opposing India’s position that Jammu and Kashmir is a bilateral issue. Similarly, in 1998, Ukraine condemned India’s nuclear test and stated that this could endanger the international nuclear non-proliferation arrangements, a stance similar to Pakistan’s. At the onset of the Russia-Ukraine war, antagonistic notes were echoed by Indian public commentators that criticised Kyiv for selling arms to Pakistan. This disclosed that India has deep-rooted historical grievances against Ukraine that it has chosen to enact at this stage.
From the above deliberations, it could be hypothesised that New Delhi’s so-called neutrality was, in fact, Russia-leaning. This is worrisome for the West as on one end India is acting as a strategic partner but on the other end, it is acting indifferent. Although New Delhi’s Russia-leaning position was anchored in ensuring open channels on both the Russian and US sides, it might become the basis for lingering uncertainty on several matters in the future. Firstly, it remains unclear how India would continue to portray and convince its neutrality to the West. Several analysts believed that India might gradually shift its position, while others backed India’s independent foreign policy. Nevertheless, Indian neutrality might remain top of meeting agendas in the West. Secondly, the future of US-India relations could become indeterminate, especially in countering Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific. Since India has empathised with Russia now, Russia has the leverage to influence India to avoid a mischievous scuffle with China. This could also make the future of India’s role as a US strategic partner debatable. If India does not stand as a bulwark against China, it might affect US efforts to stay on top of the US-China competition. Although India might have had little choice, given its national interest and foreign policy orientation, the Russian lean might become another bead in the string of vulnerabilities for India’s strategic course of action.
