Over the course of its history, the Indian Navy has played a significant role in facilitating India’s economic and military rise. With India’s economic and commercial interests stretching across oceans and a growing diaspora spread across continents, India’s maritime interests encompasses an expanding and vast array of portfolios that include securing trade and commerce, human security, overcoming asymmetric challenges , boosting coastal security, the development and preservation of ocean resources, energy security etc. After assuming the role of being a ‘net security provider’ in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR), the Indian Navy is more than ever a potent instrument of India’s foreign and security policy with a strategic mandate to fortify and bolster India’s maritime power projection capabilities. As a consequence, India’s maritime diplomacy is to assume salience in the coming decades.
With the advent of the U.S. pivot towards the Asia-Pacific region and China’s aggressive military build up in the South China Sea and rapid foray into the Indian Ocean, India needs to expand its influence in the IOR by partnering with neighbours and other littoral states in the ‘Indo-Pacific’ maritime theatre. The discussion will focus on the ‘diplomatic factor’ in India’s maritime calculus, the myriad complexities that are involved in the practice of maritime diplomacy and advancing Indian maritime interests in the IOR and beyond.
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