Putin’s War on Ukraine by Samuel Ramani

Author:Samuel Ramani [Ramani, Samuel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: C. Hurst & Co. (Publishers) Ltd
Published: 2023-03-06T00:00:00+00:00

Russia and India: An Enduring but Limited Partnership

In keeping with its neutrality during the Crimea annexation, India refused to condemn Russia after its invasion of Ukraine. On 24 February, India called for an “immediate de-escalation” of the Ukraine War and focused on the evacuation of 20,000 Indian nationals residing in Ukraine. Despite Western entreaties to condemn Russian aggression, Denmark’s claims that India could help de-escalate the war and Zelensky’s outreach to India on security guarantees, Modi has remained unflinchingly committed to neutrality. India’s policy towards Ukraine, which has been often described as “strategic ambivalence,” can be explained by three factors. The first is historical precedent: the Soviet-era partnership with New Delhi, which crystallised with Khrushchev’s 1955 support for India’s claims to Jammu and Kashmir, and New Delhi’s past reluctance to call out Soviet aggression towards Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan, conditioned Modi’s restraint.61 Anti-Ukrainian sentiments, which spiked after social media videos showing racist actions from Ukrainian officials towards Indian students surfaced, helped perpetuate the enduring pro-Russia lean in Indian society.62

Anuradha Chenoy, a Professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University, also noted India’s long tradition of opposing unilateral sanctions, apparent from its policies towards Iraq and Iran.63 India’s refusal to condemn Saddam Hussein’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait, inspired by Iraq’s support for India in Kashmir, is another relevant parallel.64 The alignment between India’s position on the Ukraine War and foreign policy traditions was challenged by Modi’s critics. Former UN Under-Secretary General Shashi Tharoor expressed disapproval with Modi’s refusal to condemn Russia’s “regime change operation” in Ukraine when it “had consistently opposed such interventions,” and urged Modi to look past Russia’s “legitimate security concerns” and call for an end to war.65 While Tharoor’s case that “resort to war is impossible to accept or justify”66 mirrors Modi’s SCO summit comments, New Delhi is unwilling to break with its historical solidarity with Russia or aversion to sanctions.

The second factor is India’s scepticism of the prevailing Western narrative that Putin is a unilateral aggressor in Ukraine, and desire to avoid taking sides in the Russia–West narrative war. Chenoy notes that Putin is not regarded as an “irrational madman” in India, as he has proven to be credible when he stated that he would not retaliate against NATO membership for Sweden and Finland, and insisted that NATO was a party in the conflict, as it was creating a Cuban Missile Crisis scenario for Russia.67 India’s unwillingness to dismiss Russian conspiracies was evident in its response to the Bucha Massacre. On 6 April, India condemned the killings but called for an “independent investigation” of who was culpable.68 Former Indian ambassador to Russia Kanwal Sibal stated that it was not in India’s interests to “endorse the U.S.’s anti-Russian policy or speak the anti-Western language of Russia.”69 This led India to highlight double standards, as it perceived the West as overreacting to events in Ukraine and downplaying similar crises elsewhere. India’s external affairs minister, S. Jaishankar, presented this argument to Liz Truss on 1 April, as he noted that Europe was much more apathetic than India to events in Afghanistan, which were much less proximate to Europe.

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