Chanakyanithi

After hundreds of years of struggle for independence India were liberated from the hands of British and by that time "development" in the form of both human and industry was the prime agenda. Hence Nehru focused less on ideological development for the nation in terms of foreign policy. He believed that commitment to any of the two existing major power blocs in the aftermath of World War II, would not serve India's goals. Thus chosen the middle path – formed non aligned and third world nations which were treated as making international opportunism. Later when Nehru emerged as a good statesman by his successful mediation of Korean War and Congo problem, India was recognized as an active nation involving in international affairs.
But still our foreign policy especially with respect to Pakistan, China, US and Middles East is ambiguous. Our policy is more of re active nature than pro active. The policy of „un intervention‟ has been in our roots since ages. The similar kind of policy was encouraged by Kautilya in his "Arthasastra‟.

“As long as an enemy is not a threat to the nation or our statehood, interfering in their public matters is treated as an invitation for war”.

Making friendship with enemy‟s enemy and friend‟s friend is an old but still valid belief. Making deals with enemy himself such that any kind of voluntary step towards hostility by any one nation can be condemned was widely believed and practiced by Nehru. Hence treaty "Panchsheel‟ was agreed by Nehru and his Chinese counterpart. But even those are violated by Chinese and no action could be taken by either the UN or victim India. Also turning our focus on United States, our policy of business with them is still ambiguous owing to the different ideologies (Socialism, Capitalism co exists in India). As far as Pakistan is concerned, India is to an extent right in not intervening in its recent turmoil. But we failed to send a strong message to eradicate the roots of terrorism. There are ideological issues with a few countries, boundary issues with a few, political, economic and diplomatic issues with others. Hence it requires a country specific foreign policy which has to be reconstructed and integrated with nation‟s overall strategic interest.

Fig: Model for a Country specific foreign policy

Medieval history speaks about imperialism through war and religion. Modern history speaks about imperialism through trade and ideology. But today the world is more complex and integrated. It is the strategy and foreign policy which leads to achieve the long term interest of a nation. Hence through the next half of the essay let us confine ourselves building a foreign policy towards China. China has interests in Africa region obviously for its unexplored natural resources and nevertheless India too entered the region but seen as less aggressive nation. There is a lot of scope for development of relations with the African nations in terms of trade, education, tourism.

India has to improve relations with all the neighboring nations of China- Burma, Thailand, South Korea, Japan (which was highly neglected during Nehruvian era), Philippines, Mongolia, and Kazakhstan.
Relationships and treaties for supplying raw material and making them considerably dependent on Indian exports/ imports will be a highly effective strategy for long term. The islands in the Pacific Ocean region help as fuel refilling stations for ships transporting goods and trade material to and from China. Hence no island must be spared for and excellent relationship must be developed through trade and education. This will be helpful to get a support from those nations in times of war by blocking trade- transport areas of China with other nations. For example considering South Korea, there has been a trade of $ 10 billion only and has a lot of scope for improvement. Identifying the basic requirements of the nation and providing them for cheaper costs make the relation stronger and dependable. Japan is a robust nation with strong fundamentals in terms of technology and defense. Also Japan, China and US have very thin relations since ages. India can definitely play a significant role for collaboration between the nations. At the same time high interventionism among their relations may cause India getting crushed and impacted. India should act as a mediator and a leader between developing countries in Asia pacific and Africa regions. Now if we look at existing trade relations with China, majority of our exports consists of iron ore, organic chemicals, cotton and imports are finished and manufactured goods. This kind of trade causes India to reduce its natural resources in few centuries if not decades. This causes India to depend on neighboring nations for natural resources. Hence exports of natural resources has to be reduced to a minimum and local manufacturing development units have to be developed extensively for lessening the dependency on China.
Hence Foreign policy, trade and commerce, defense systems have to move hand in hand internally in India and design country specific policies to suit our long term strategic interests. Considering the question of developing friends, it is only through trade with which the friendship can be tied. Also though intervening in neighbor‟s matters is not in the genetics of Indians, expressing a strong view points, making standing on commitments can be made which make other countries see India as a powerful nation. For example expressing our strong concern over military rule in Burma and arrest of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi kind of issues make India looked a bit polarized and as a leader in the region. Coefficient of influence has to be increased through trade and expressing strong view points on internal matters of a nation, but not through interventionism and war as done by US in Iraq and Afghanistan which lead to excessive military expenditure and slow down of its own economy.

I would like to end with the words quoted by Abdul Kalam

“We develop and test nuclear arms to show case to the world that we are powerful. Being powerful we are not sending a message of war but a message of peace that not to initiate a war with us”.