2

Indian Thinking in
International Relations
Siddharth Mallavarapu

Introduction
It is no secret that international relations (IR) as a discipline has tended to be AngloAmerican ethnocentric in character. In the nineteenth century, Great Britain dominated
the study of international relations. British dominance was contested by the United States
in the second half of the twentieth century and this development also found its echoes,
eventually in an American hegemony over the discipline (Waever 1998; Schmidt 1998).
As a provocation, it is perhaps not unforeseeable to visualize ceteris paribus given Chinas
growing clout in international affairs that by the middle of the twenty-first century an unmistakable Chinese footprint with its own schools of thought might well be registered much
more strongly in international relations than it has in both the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries. Why has disciplinary international relations tended to be so integrally connected with the changing fortunes of powerful players in the international system? What
about the several others in the international system who possess neither the power nor
the pelf of the major powers. It is ironical that, though the Global South in terms of brute
empirics populates most of our political universe encompassing large swathes of Asia,
Southern America and Africa, it has nevertheless remained by and large peripheral to the
discipline of international relations. By implication, these actors have often been perceived
as low stakeholders in determining the overall trajectory of the discipline as well.
It is against this backdrop (given its unfamiliarity as well as changing standing
within the contemporary international system) that the story of Indian IR generates
more than a degree of curiosity today. In the course of the chapter, I address three
issues. At the outset, I begin by clarifying my usage of the terms, Indian thinking in
international relations. Second, I examine four arguments about the nature and sensibilities at work in Indian IR. Finally, I sample reflections on some recurring themes

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of international politics as viewed from an Indian vantage point. These include assessments of Indian foreign policy, bilateral relations, ethnicity and state-building
questions, regionalism and multilateralism. I must forewarn the reader that this is
by no means intended to be an exhaustive state of the art review of literature of all
available Indian IR writings. That is a task that needs to be undertaken afresh by every
generation with some seriousness and rigour, but will have to await another moment.
Elements of Indian political thought have received attention in some scholarly works
(Mehta 1992; Parekh 1989; Pantham and Deutsch 1986; Ghose 1984; Appadorai
1970; Bandhopadhyaya 1969; Damodaran 1967). My objective here is much more
circumscribed. I gesture to some bodies of literature, from the past as well as the
present, in order to give the reader a sense of both the menu of issues as well as the
modes of argumentation employed by some well-known exemplars, drawing from
different generations of Indian IR scholarship.

Conceptualizing Indian IR
What is Indian IR about? Who are its principal protagonists and detractors? In what
fashion has it been institutionalized and with what effect? These are questions which
any student of international relations in India is likely to confront and mull over at
some point or the other. Unfortunately, given the absence of a comprehensive account of the discipline and its evolution in India, we must for the time being rely
more on available assessments, robust common sense, good hunches and impressions
of what appears to have transpired in the Indian variant of the discipline. My own
phenomenological experience, both as a student and teacher of international relations
in one of Indias pre-eminent schools of international studies, generates a particular
picture of the state of affairs. I have no doubt that there are several other plausible
competing versions of the animating drives of Indian IR, but I will confine myself to
conveying these perceptions for what they are worth.
By Indian IR, I refer to scholars living and working in the field of international
relations in India. The works of these scholars stem from their particular institutional
locations in India and is also reflected in their participation in debates that acquire
some urgency in the Indian context (Bajpai 2009). These inquiries relate, generally
speaking, to traditional foreign policy questions, bilateral relations between India and
the major powers and its immediate South Asian neighbours, questions pertaining to
ethnicity and nation-building, regionalism and multilateralism. This is not to suggest
that these scholars do not see themselves as participating in IR debates outside of their
own national settings. However, they remain conscious of their location and speak in
accents more specific to their local milieu.
International relations as a discipline in India took off with the establishment of the Indian School of International Studies (ISIS) in 1955. Prior to this, the
Indian Council of World Affairs (ICWA) was established in New Delhi in 1943. Indias first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehrus influence in shaping perceptions

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relating to India and the world is legion. His erudition on these matters was often
without any parallel. This had both its pros and cons. On the positive side of the ledger, Nehru worked hard to inform the Indian public about the significance of world
affairs and the rationale for the Indian stance on various questions ranging from nonalignment, new statehood, decolonization and its implications, development, human
rights, the value of multilateralism and nuclear disarmament. By any standards, he
was an eloquent speaker and also wrote at great length explaining the bases for Indias
various engagements with the external world. On the negative side, Nehrus expertise and ideological slant stymied independent scholarship because there was hardly
anybody from within the domestic academia who felt they could adequately contest
or critique Nehrus foreign policy (Bajpai 2005). It was not merely an issue of intellectual wherewithal. It also had much to do with the manner in which international
relations, along with other social sciences in India, saw its task as one primarily contributing to the state-building project (Bajpai 2005: 1738). As a consequence, this
led to a deficit in terms of a more critical evaluation of state policy and was manifest
in a rationalization of the official stance on a range of issues (Rana 1988).
Another important development in the early years of Indian IR was the emulation of the area studies tradition. International relations came to be equated with
area studies and this had enormous implications in the subsequent years, when IR
theory received short shrift because of this conflation(Sahni 2009: 4968). While
area studies scholars were interested in ideographic accounts, it would require a
more rigorous tradition of engagement with IR theory that would make possible
broader nomothetic formulations within the discipline. The ISIS which was merged
subsequently with Jawaharlal Nehru University and was re-christened as the School
of International Studies (SIS) reflects very much the area studies model at play.
While a rigorous area studies tradition could have potentially provided an essential
corrective to grand and middle-range theories, unfortunately in the Indian instance
this was not to be the case. With the exception of some scholars, area studies did
not fully live up to its original intent or promise. A part of the problem was that
funding remained woefully inadequate, inhibiting the possibility of long periods
of stay by scholars in their relevant areas of study. This further impinged on familiarizing themselves with the requisite language skillsa basic pre-requisite for
good area studies (Rajan 2005: 195204). Two other complex processes appear
to be at work. The first, given an absence of rigorous training or exposure to the
main strands of IR theory generated a suspicion of theory and at times a misplaced
animus (Sahni 2009). Most accounts, therefore, tend to provide rich analytical histories of certain episodes in the life of the new nation, but do not explicitly tell us
from which theoretical position the author advances her case. This explains, at least
in part, why many of the writings of the first generation of IR scholars in India do
not engage explicit IR theory. Second, along with a degree of intellectual diffidence
and disguised awe about Western knowledge systems, there was sometimes a misplaced nationalism that bred a particular form of insularity where no conscious attempt was made to offer a comparative picture of states similarly placed in history and

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the implications they carried as latecomers for the international system.* There
were, of course, honourable exceptions to both these impulses within even the first
generation of IR scholarship, but the norm more often tended to exhibit elements
of the complexes gestured to.
The first strides of Indian IR could have benefited considerably from the anticolonial nationalist legacy. After all,
the intellectual climate in which Indian nationalists lived was not isolationist. The great leaders
of Indian thought in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries like Raja Rammohan Roy, Swami
Vivekananda and Rabindranath Tagore looked far back to Indias past, but stressed the unity
of all universe and showed keen interest in the world outside. The early leaders of the Congress,
Dadabhai Naoroji, Surendranath Banerjea and Gopal Krishna Gokhale, inspired by a study of
European history and political institutions, saw the salvation of India in close association with
Britain. Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi based their teachings on old
Indian currents of thought, but never advanced isolation from the rest of the world.
Prasad 1962: 67
Although Indian IR really took off only in the late 1960s and early 1970s, it did partake of some of the intellectual excitement that was part of the anti-colonialist Indian
experience. It was acutely conscious of Indias third world location, given the significance of non-alignment both as doctrine and policy in the Nehru years; a large part
of the initial effort was to explicate its various nuances to audiences both at home and
abroad. The early years of Indian IR also witnessed the presence of some well-known
international scholars who visited India for varying durations of time. Hans Morgenthau, Quincy Wright and Hedley Bull all visited India and clearly made an impact
on their Indian counterparts. Unfortunately, this stream of scholar visitors dried up
subsequently, partly perhaps due to Indias economic outlook that also became more
and more inward looking. Today the trend is rather different again, with a number
of scholars from even the traditional Anglo-American world visiting and curious to
inform themselves more about developments in India.
However, a word of caution about interpreting what some might argue as a more
banal cosmopolitanism which informs the IR academia in India today (Beck 2006).
While there is clearly a surge in the intellectual interest about India in the external
world, there also needs to be a corresponding Indian curiosity about the world outside home. Clearly, there is a greater willingness to acknowledge traditions of thinking within India, to re-open the archives and examine alternative currents of thought
or echoes of universal principles in local debates.
While the new trend is clearly welcome, given the earlier epistemic toll of colonialism, one also needs to guard against any nativism or reverse ethnocentrism which
extols the virtues of the local and remains hostile to anything outside that frame
(Spivak 1985). It is in this context that I identify and examine four arguments, with
implications for better appreciating the intellectual history of Indian IR and the possible directions it may take in the not so distant future.

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Four Arguments About International Relations in India

Argument 1: The Early Case for Inclusivity
in International Relations Theory
One of the early audits (little more than three decades ago) of Indian IR appeared
in a contribution by K. P. Misra titled Indias Contributions to International Relations Theory. It struck me as particularly intriguing, given that the intervention
consciously draws attention to theory rather than international relations more
generically, especially given the strong area studies provenance of Indian IR. It makes
some interesting claims regarding international relations in India and its influences
and the need, generally speaking, for a more inclusive understanding of what international relations does and whom it excludes. Misra argues that [t]heories based on
the principles and practices of only powerful countries are bound to be introverted
in nature. They will remain only partial theories and thus will be able to explain the
international reality only partially (Misra 1980: 226227).
Two formative influences have been important as far as the Indian unfolding of
IR practice has been concerned. Misra distils these influences when he suggests that
... the two most influential streams of thought have been the positivistic philosophical framework of Kautilya and the moralistic philosophy enunciated and practiced
by Buddha and Ashoka (Ibid.: 219). He goes on to observe that [o]f the two, the
latterthe moralistic philosophical tradition, had a deep impact on Gandhi. To
an extent this also influenced a whole set of Indias nationalistic leaders, including
Jawaharlal Nehru whose role in shaping the countrys international behaviour was
singularly important (Ibid.: 219).
Misra is particularly concerned about the implications for IR theory stemming
from the emergence of new states in the international system. While conceding that
the newly decolonized world is also not monolithic in character, he does make the
case for their being taken more seriously even when it comes to theorizing international political life. He points out that:
the policies, and arising out of them the roles, of the new states of Asia, Africa and Latin
America in international relations in recent decades perhaps do not permit us to create a close
knit and coherent theoretical model of international relations but they do call for an effort to
evolve a broad framework in the light of their international behaviour.
Misra 1980: 215
Misra also alludes to the problem of treating a national interest formulation namely, non-alignment in the Indian context ... as an integrated and coherent international doctrine (Ibid.: 219). However, he does argue that [o]ut of the broad philosophy
and framework of non-alignment some other concepts have also grown which have a
good deal of relevance for the theory of international relations (Ibid.: 223).
Misras account reflects many of the tensions which continue to persist while
thinking about international relations in India today. These relate to the asymmetry

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between the West and the East or the global North and the South, the need to distil a
complex history and derive from that inheritance some key principles (while avoiding the risk of essentializing) which might be of relevance from the perspective of
theorizing international politics more generically, as also the tensions between official
practice and autonomous theoretical thinking.

Argument 2: Resistance to Theory in India

Another set of arguments relating to the development of the field of international
relations in India draw from the work of Kanti Bajpai. Three key reasons are cited
for the somewhat stunted growth of Indian IR. The first relates to the residues of
history, namely Indias colonial past. Bajpai argues that:
[f]rom the colonial powers viewpoint, the last thing Indians would get was any sort of control
over external policy. London might be willing to share some degree of responsibility for internal
administration, economic management, and social affairs, but to do so for external matters
was tantamount to gaining independence.
Bajpai 2005: 21
An equally contributory factor to the inhibited development of Indian IR has been
alluded to earlier. Simply put, ... Nehrus expertise in international affairs, in the
long term, was as much a constraint as an encouragement in the development of
International Studies (Ibid.: 22). A third and perhaps most compelling logic for the
nature of the Indian variant of international relations had to do with its relation to
the State. International studies in India has suffered because of the strong perception that state officials possess the best knowledge relating to the actual dynamics
and workings of international politics. Second, there is a tendency to be less critical
of the state ... to the detriment of a critical-minded field of study (Ibid.: 24). Finally, there is the thorny but vital issue of accessing relevant data for ones research.
The state is the custodian of this data and often shows a reluctance to share this data
among its academics, especially when they could well be critical of state policy.
More fundamentally, Bajpai observes that there is a considerable degree of resistance to theory in Indian IR (Ibid.: 25). Three arguments help substantiate this claim.
First, Bajpai suggests that during the 1950s and the 1960s when Indian IR was making its early beginnings, the theories then in vogue did not find an audience in India
for various reasons. To begin with, ... systems theory seemed to be primarily about
the interactions of the Great Powers and said little about those outside that ambit,
except as objects of the Great Power system (Ibid.: 26). There was uncertainty about
the worth of embracing Integration theories, considering that India had just become
independent and sovereign, and to the extent that integration connoted an abridgment of independence and sovereignty, Indians were sceptical (Ibid.: 27). When it
came to theories of nuclear deterrence again, ... India did not possess nuclear weapons, nor was it likely to in the near future, and the constraints of nuclearisation on the
exercise of force did not therefore apply (Ibid.: 27). It appears that the only theory
that did have some purchase was political realism (Ibid.: 27).

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Things however appeared to have changed in the intervening years in some respects. Bajpai argues today that:
the influence of the early years has declined; there is a greater interest in theory even as the
desire to be policy relevant remains alive. The theory menu in front of Indian scholars is much
larger and more exciting, and the interest in Indian contributions to non-Indian IR publications is growing. Among Indian scholars, there is also a better understanding of IR as a field
distinct from area studies. The relationship to the Indian state has improved: state functionaries have a better understanding of the role of academics in a democratic society.
Bajpai 2009: 126
All these developments augur well for the future of IR thinking in India.

Argument 3: Postcolonial Dualism in Indian Writings

in International Law
A third argument relates directly to the intellectual history of a rich and vibrant subfield of international relations in India, namely international law. Focusing on the relationship between law and periphery, B. S. Chimni provides us an incisive account
of the dualism that had come to characterize Indian international law scholarship.
This had to do in large measure with the compromising nature of the post colonial
statethat could neither enhance the welfare of subaltern groups nor consistently
pursue policies of anti-imperialismand the tight embrace of established traditions,
methods and rules of international law turned into an Achilles heel (Chimni 2010:
25). What makes international law particularly relevant, from the perspective of Indian thinking in international relations, is that it remained particularly self-conscious
and keen to carve out a distinct third world sensibility. As Chimni suggests:
... it is worth affirming at the very outset that the story of international law scholarship in
post-colonial India is not only one of failures and disappointments but also a story of profound
interventions, not the least of which has been the successful articulation, over many generations, of Third World approaches to international law (TWAIL).
Chimni 2010: 27
It is crucial to note that the first generation of Indian international law scholars
were keen to ... reaffirm the civilizational unity of India and sustain the idea that India
should play a central role in world politics (2010: 28). Distinguishing between the
first and second generation of TWAIL scholarship, Chimni argues that in TWAIL I ...
the relationship of international law with deep structures did not receive an adequate
response in the absence of a profounder understanding of the economic and political structures of global capitalism (Ibid.: 40). This changed with TWAIL II which ...
underlined the structural and discursive constraints in the international system and
emphasized the need to shape and adopt an alternative critical vocabulary (Ibid.: 43).
The story of Indian international law provides room for some optimism about the
possible maps for inducing a degree of self-confidence in developing a distinctively

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third world sensibility as far as international relations is concerned. If ... despite its
weaknesses Indian international law scholarship has, since the middle of the last century, been at the forefront of articulating a third world approach to international law and
made seminal contributions to different branches of international law there is hope
for other traditional areas of IR inquiry as well. An important lesson to learn from the
international law experience is to explore more deeply our own epistemic resources
and communicate key ideas with a degree of confidence to a wider world outside
(Ibid.: 49). Figures like R. P. Anand of the first generation, who received their training at Yale, had a particularly significant influence in providing a sound philosophical
armature and orientation to the study of international law from its inception in India.
Most critically, they helped foster a conducive climate for intellectual dignity and selfesteem in scholarly pursuit outside of the confines of the Anglo-American academia.

Argument 4: A Case for Indian Political Theory

The fourth argument here about international relations in India draws tangentially from
reflections within the precincts of adjoining political theory scholarship in India. Rajeev
Bhargava contends with similar issues in the domain of political theory and asks, [i]s
there an Indian political theory? (2010: 5678). Answering in the affirmative, he suggests that ... certain world historical developments ... include clear signs that the period of second colonization might be coming to an end (Ibid.: 68). While Bhargava
is suspicious of strong endorsals of a sociology of knowledge stance in evaluating the
influence of the West and the earlier diffidence of the non-West, he points out that:
[o]nce we realize that political reflections have not been structured in the sub-continent in the
manner in which it has been done in the West, it is not difficult or preposterous to support the
claim that a critical tradition of political theory does not exist in India or at least that political
theory in India is underdeveloped.
Bhargava 2010: 56
Further, he adds that [w]e first mistook the ideal world of western political theory
as lived reality of the West and then began to imagine this real world as our own
habitat or one where we shall live (Ibid.: 61).
Clarifying his stance on the sociology of knowledge question, Bhargava argues
that he is ... not committed to the strong programme of sociology of knowledge
for which concepts and theories are rigidly located with an immovable allegiance to
specific interests. He concedes that ... many concepts and theories possess a degree
of flexibility and mobility that makes for multiple applications in contexts different
from which they emerged (Ibid.: 67). But more significantly, the crux of the matter
is his claim that:
... the rejection of the strong programme of sociology of knowledge helps to see that concepts
and theories can be decontextualized, relocated, and then invested with different meaning
and intonation. This complex practice of decontextualization and recontextualization must

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be pursued. To understand how to decontextualize, we need to rely on available theoretical

traditions. To know what precisely to recontextualize, we must have a strong practical grasp
of our own social practices.
Bhargava 2010: 68
In terms of a programme for Indian political theory, Bhargava is of the view
that the more urgent question now concerns the internal structure of concepts
evolved in India and what happened to them with the advent of colonial modernity (Ibid.: 69).
International relations in India also stands to gain by a similar epistemic politics
of recontextualization. For far too long we have somewhat uncritically accepted theories
which do not necessarily speak to our immediate concerns here. While it is important
to have a good grasp of the claims of existing bodies of theory (minimally to avoid
re-inventing the wheel), we must eschew a tendency to quickly graft existing theories onto other contexts unimaginatively, often generating unsatisfactory accounts
of what best explains political behaviour in this part of the world. The lack of fit
between mainstream IR theories and local contexts might not be a reason to lament. It
might indeed provide a good opening to re-examine often taken for granted associations between key variables.

Some Recurring Themes in Indian IR

IR thinking has traditionally veered around issues of foreign policy (Prasad 1962;
Appadorai 1969; Bandhopadhyaya 1979; Jetley 1985; Kapur 1994; Mansingh 1999;
Dixit 1998; Dutt 1999; Rajamohan 2007; Mehta 2009). It is no surprise then that a
fair amount of IR commentary, particularly in the early years, dealt with Indias external orientation as an independent postcolonial state. Distinguishing between both
generic and particularistic elements of foreign policy, Angadipuram Appadorai
argued that:
the really noteworthy features of Indias foreign policy, in a broad sense, are three: the policy
of nonalignment; her desire to follow the Indian tradition that the right means must be adopted
to achieve a desired end, however much she herself might fall short of the ideal; and her approach to questions of war and peace with what may seem an undue emphasis on negotiation
as a means of securing agreement on points of difference.
Appadorai 1969: 194
Bimla Prasad argues that:
the feeling that India was the natural leader of the Afro-Asian world was, however never accompanied by any desire to dominate over the countries of the region, or to interfere in their
affairs. The Congress was absolutely free from any imperialist or expansionist urge even before

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the advent of Gandhi and Nehru and, in its early years, repeatedly advocated a policy towards
Indias neighbours based on the principle of non-interference in their affairs. In the era of
Gandhi and Nehru this healthy trend was further strengthened.
Prasad 1962: 278279
K. P. Misra was of the view that:
a non-aligned country like India, which came of its own soon after the conclusion of the
Second World War and which had the misfortune of being a party to about half a dozen
conflicts with its neighbours, went through the experience which brought diverse lessons. Its
freedom movement was unique[ly] internationally oriented largely on account of the vision of
Jawaharlal Nehru.
Misra 1980: 225
A recognized classic in the field of UN multilateralism is M. S. Rajans seminal
work, United Nations and Domestic Jurisdiction (1961). The work of K. P. Saksena on UN
Reforms and C. S. R. Murthys account of the Indian diplomatic practice in the United
Nations (1993) built systematically on a deeper interest in India and global multilateralism. B. S. Chimnis work has also focused on the role of contemporary international institutions and has highlighted their complicity in advancing an imperial
global state (2004).
There are some oft repeated motifs in the early accounts of Indian foreign policy.
Nehrus persona and larger-than-life presence clearly left an indelible impression on
commentaries during the formative years of Indian foreign policy. Questions of ethics and foreign policy, the issue of means and ends, the justice argument relating to
the accommodation of newly decolonized states in the international system, faith in
multilateralism and detailed expositions of the concept and dynamics relating to nonalignment garnered a great deal of attention.
It is also not uncommon to see that high politics (in the Morgenthauian idiom)
dominated a great deal of IR thinking in India then and continues to do so even today.
Questions related to traditional conceptions of state security generate considerable
attention within scholarship. K. Subrahmanyam is a key figure as far as the Indian
variant of strategic studies is concerned. He has several works to his credit and wrote
regularly, both in the national and international press, often providing the underlying rationale for Indias transition from nuclear ambiguity to being a declared nuclear
weapon state. He also authored an important evaluation of the Kargil episode in South
Asias very recent history (Subrahmanyam 1972, 1986, 2000).
As a subset of an interest in Indian foreign policy, there was also attention devoted
to Indias equations with the major powers (the superpowers during the Cold War
years) and ever since independence, Indias relations with Pakistan and its immediate
South Asian neighbours, and in subsequent years (post-1962) with China. Specific
periods of these relationships also constituted one strand of reflection. For instance,
M. S. Venkataramini scrutinized the 194758 period in terms of the American role in
Pakistan. Some broader portraits continue to carry as much relevance today as when
they were originally written.

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Venkataramini suggests that:

What is needed is to carry to the American people the message that certain actions that are represented to them as justified for global security reasons may devastate the lives and institutions
of people in distant countries who have done no harm to the United States and that, in the long
run, the consequences of such actions may turn out to be harmful to the United States itself.
Venkataramini 1982: 415416
There has also been interesting work on South Asian regionalism. The involvement
of major external powers has been viewed as particularly significant in this context.
According to S. D. Muni and Anuradha Muni:
The existing regionalism theory suffers from a European cultural bias as Western Europe has
been the main focus and concern of its formulation. Even while studying third world regions
within the framework of this theory, the underlying assumption seems to have maintained
that the European experience in regionalism will be followed and replicated.
Muni and Muni 1984: 2
Questions of ethnicity and nation-building in the South Asian context have also
received close scrutiny in some accounts. Characterizing South Asia as a kaleidoscope
of latent, overt and explosive ethnicity, Urmila Phadnis also has an issue with an uncritical acceptance of European usages in the region (1989: 12). She observes:
[a]s regards the statist approach; the European heritage of the term nation-state has pervaded
global terminology as evident from nomenclature like the League of Nations, the United
Nations, International Politics, the International Court of Justice. Strictly speaking, these are
misnomers but the very usage of the term reflects the mood and orientations of the people who
mattered, regarding these terms.
Phadnis 1989: 21
Her overall claim is that:
... the challenges of ethnicity and nation-building, operating in a highly complex nexus of
society, economy and polity, hinge on issues of access and stakes in the power structure. In this
context, the experiences of the South Asian states are instructive as well as illuminating. These
polyethnic societies are characterized by greater ethnic diversity than perhaps any other region
in the world. However, in terms of boundary delineation, levels of development, content, context,
constraints, as well as the potential of the varied demands for recognition, power and status,
uniformities as well as variations among the ethnic groups across the borders can be discerned.
Phadnis 1989: 29
The issue of third world conflict has received attention in the work of scholars like
A. P. Rana. He argues that:
... Buzans view of the eventual emergence of truly indigenous regional security complexes with the removal of the European colonial and Cold War overlays may prove to be
premature, even sanguine. The uni-superpower of the world and its associates have reason to be
concerned about their present inability to deal with the state of ethnic and other crises erupting

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in Third World areas, and closer at home, even in Europe. There is an intractability about
them which is disturbing.
Rana 1996: 145
Conflict in the IndoPak situation remains a particular subset of this attention. The
prescriptions to ameliorate the conflict have also varied considerably. According to
Pratap Bhanu Mehta:
in the final analysis we need a political culture in both India and Pakistan that understands
that sometimes nationalism is the enemy of national interest; we need a political culture that
is prepared to pay a short-run price for imagining a new architecture for the subcontinent, and
we need a political culture that will allow both countries to transcend the sediments of history that are weighing them down. Unless all this changes we will remain trapped in current
paradigms and assumptions.
Mehta 2003: 2017
An impressive corpus of work by Ashis Nandy, ranging from critiques of modernity to the inadequacy of History as a vehicle to understand South Asian modes
of cognition, the illegitimacy of nationalism and the significance of non-statist
expressions of political imagination have a fundamental bearing on our conception
of politics for any critically minded IR scholar (Blaney and Inayatullah 1994). Nandy
remains arguably the best foil in the South Asian context against an imperialism of
categories which students of international relations also need to remain eternally
wary of (1983, 1987, 1989, 1995a, b). The seminal work of Partha Chatterjee on nationalism, his critique of Benedict Andersons Imagined Communities and the implications
of this from the perspective of decoding postcolonial politics also remains important
for IR scholars, especially in the Global South (1986, 1993). In this context, mention may also be made of Neera Chandhokes interventions from the political Left on
questions of global democracy and global justice that are of substantive relevance to
serious students of world politics (2003, 2007, 2008).
In the space of the last decade, there has been a concerted effort by scholars within
the region to evidence scholarship from within India in the sphere of international
relations. In 2005, Kanti Bajpai and I co-edited two volumes which brought together
several writings by Indian scholars covering a wide range of issue-areas. One of the
crucial objectives of this endeavour was to affirm the existence of a community of
scholars engaging IR theory from India. The effort also consciously sought to avoid
the Delhi-centrism that has been a dominant refrain in the unfolding of the discipline in India. These contributions engaged consciously various strands of contemporary IR theory in the light of the lived empirics of the region.
The first of these volumes derived its title (International Relations in India: Bringing Theory
Back Home) from an earlier intervention by Bajpai. The opening three entries in the
volume all speak to concerns related to the development of international relations in
India. Sequentially, the first of these contributions has been discussed earlier in this
chapter, with arguments advanced by Bajpai about why international relations in India
demonstrates, among several other attributes, a concerted resistance to theory. In my

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Siddharth Mallavarapu

chapter, I examine inflections and conversations relating to states, nationalisms and

modernities in India and tease implications they may carry in the manner in which
puzzles are posed in international relations from this milieu. A third of the Indian IR
disciplinary history interventions is by A. P. Rana and K. P. Misra, written originally
for an international symposium in 1988. The chapter makes a very persuasive case for
taking theory far more seriously than has been the case in the past, if the Indian variant
of international relations is to be enriched (Bajpai and Mallavarapu 2005). The volume
reflects a wide variety of theoretical engagements by scholars with distinct normative
commitments. Feminists, liberals, neo-Marxists, postcolonialists and realists all apply
their approaches to various facets of international political life.
International Relations in India: Theorising the Region and Nation (2005), the companion
volume also modelled on similar lines, built and drew on a wide variety of scholarly writings by Indian scholars. Conceptual dissections of third world conflict, the
competing bases of nationalism, debates between realists and culturalists on foreign
policy, neorealist claims about the IndoPak conflicts, non-alignment discourses, the
impact of colonial legacies on Indian geopolitics, the fluid and unsettled nature of territoriality in the region as well as an account of what Indian state responses to terrorism tell us about prevalent IR discourses were all integral to the collective. Assembling
both these volumes represented to our minds as co-editors, a modest beginning in
reaffirming community and showcasing the nature of Indian engagement against the
backdrop of the global palate of international relations.
In 2008, another co-edited volume focused on the search for an alternative paradigm in the South Asian context (Behera 2008). Drawing on contributions from South
Asia, the book addressed some issues again relating to IR practice in the region. Specific
theoretical pieces relating to Structure-Agency debates in the context of Indias strategic orientation (Sahni 2008), questions of external and internal conflicts in South Asia
(Chatterjee 2008) along with an account of the weaknesses of liberal IR theory from the
South Asian standpoint also featured prominently in the volume (Ramakrishnan 2008).
In 2011, E. Sridharan added to the growing body of reflection on South Asian
contributions to IR theory by editing two volumes in this regard. The first volume focuses more specifically on the available modalities of regional cooperation, the blurring lines between the domestic and the international and the influence of political
economy configurations on regional cooperation in South Asia (Sridharan 2011a).
The second volume has a stronger focus on the applications of IR theory to the strategic make-up of South Asia and focuses as well on the social construction of images, identities, world-views and normative frameworks in this context (Sridharan
2011b). On the whole, both these volumes add significantly to our existing repertoire of writings on IR theory and, most importantly, consciously advance academic
collaboration among scholars in the region across generations. An added virtue of
this collection is that many of these studies have involved periods of fieldwork in the
South Asian region, giving a rich empirical feel to the volume, quite apart from its
laudable theoretical ambition.
A trend which is visible in disciplinary conversations in international relations,
both globally and in the subcontinent as well, is the acknowledgment of the value of

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35

historicizing many of our current predicaments. Two recent illustrations of this turn to
history trend relate to the work on Nehrus strategic worldview (Raghavan 2010) and
an account of Mughal strategic practices (Vivekanandan 2011). It is not hard to fathom
the possibility of more studies along these lines by Indian scholars in the years to come.

Conclusion
The purpose of this chapter was to address three questions. The first related to clarifying what is meant by the term Indian IR, the second issue related to exploring
arguments about the lineage and trajectory of international relations in India, and the
third set of issues related to giving a snapshot or glimpse of the content and modes
of argumentation that have tended to animate different generations of scholarship in
Indian IR. With regard to the first question, my usage of Indian IR is confined to
those who study international relations living in India. Many of these scholars were
acutely conscious of Indias colonial past and its emergence in the international system as a new actor, along with other decolonized states. Second, given that the accent
on state-building was strong, particularly in the foundational years of the Indian state,
it also manifest itself in terms of an absence of sharp critique of official policies and
a general status quoism, particularly in the first generation. The first generation was
not unaware of the internationalist influences in the anti-colonial nationalist movement, but with the passage of time the orientation tended to become more inward
looking. The second generation of IR scholarship which I trace to the late 1980s and
early 1990s onwards had begun to take theory more seriously and sift through the
relevance of claims to the South Asian milieu. It also appears less diffident when it
comes to opening up its own traditions of political thinking and is keen to re-examine
the work of hitherto neglected figures in Indian political thought.
With regard to the second dimension, I examine four distinct clusters of argument
that seek to provide us an audit or big picture perspective of the nature of Indian
IR. The first argument articulated by K. P. Misra makes a strong plea for greater inclusivity in terms of the cast of players as far as the study of international relations
is concerned. The second argument is best represented in the work of Kanti Bajpai
and examines the contingent peculiarities that left an indelible imprint in which the
discipline of international relations shaped in Indiathese contingencies relate to the
specific history of British colonization of India, the larger than life role of Nehru and
its implications for IR scholarship in India, and the nature of the compact between the
state and its scholars. A third argument which I have outlined relates to the complex
dilemmas and motivations of a subfield of international relations, international law
and its unfolding in the Indian setting. B. S. Chimni points to a peculiar dualism that
has informed the development of international law in India, flowing from its colonial
past and the post colonial states aspiration but inability to mount an anti-imperialist
set of policies. However, notwithstanding this problem, Chimni argues that international law provides a sound illustration of the efforts to develop a distinct third world
sensibility best reflected in two generations of TWAIL scholarship. A fourth and

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Siddharth Mallavarapu

final argument draws from the work of Indian political theorist Rajeev Bhargava and
makes the case for a recontextualization of political theory in the light of Indian realities.
Rejecting a strong sociology of knowledge stance, Bhargava concedes the possibility
of interrogating received wisdom afresh in the light of renewed empirical attention
to Indian practices and a fresh look at available archives.
Finally, I have attempted to showcase elements of Indian scholarship with regard to
some fairly staple issues in Indian IR. These relate to foreign policy, ethnicity and nationbuilding in South Asia, regionalism, India and the major powers and bilateral equations
with Pakistan. I have also drawn attention to the spate of recent works which seek to
consolidate elements of Indian thinking in international relations. A welcome trend in
recent years has been the move to history within both the global as well as the Indian
variant of international relations. My sense is that this augurs well for Indian IR, because
it takes us back to fundamental issues of where we come from and what best explains our
political behaviour both at home and internationally. Without being complacent about
these developments, there is room for cautious optimism about the next wave of Indian
IR scholarship (Mallavarapu 2009). Better resourced and definitely better connected to
the larger world outside, Indian IR is at as interesting a conjuncture as India itself is in.

Acknowledgement
I would like to express my special gratitude to Vineet Thakur for his research assistance on this piece.

Endnote
*I would like to record my gratitude to Anindya Saha for alerting me to this dimension.

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