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Abstract
This article analyzes the ramifications of India's post-2001 policy in Afghanistan for the regional balance of power in South Asia. It examines the key elements of India's extensive engagement, which has been primarily focused on development and reconstruction assistance, and its strategic objective of ensuring a friendly and stable government in Kabul. The study's central focus is on how this policy is viewed from the perspective of Pakistan and its impact on the India-Pakistan rivalry. The research argues that Pakistan perceives India's growing influence in Afghanistan as a major strategic threat, a form of "strategic encirclement," and that this perception is a major driver of its own policies in Afghanistan, including its alleged support for the Taliban. The paper posits that Afghanistan has become a key theater for the playing out of the broader Indo-Pakistani conflict. The analysis concludes that India's successful policy in Afghanistan has significantly enhanced its regional influence but has also exacerbated the security dilemma with Pakistan, with profound and often-destabilizing ramifications for the entire region.
Full Text
India's active and influential role in post-2001 Afghanistan has been a cornerstone of its foreign policy, but one with profound and often-destabilizing ramifications for the regional balance of power. This paper provides an in-depth analysis of these ramifications. The study begins by outlining the key features of India's "soft power" strategy in Afghanistan, detailing its significant contributions to institution-building, infrastructure development, and human resource capacity. The core of the article, however, is an examination of how this strategy is interpreted through the lens of the India-Pakistan rivalry. It delves into the deep-seated security perceptions of the Pakistani military establishment, which views India's presence in Afghanistan as a hostile move aimed at undermining Pakistan from its western flank. The paper analyzes how this perception of "strategic encirclement" has, in turn, shaped Pakistan's own Afghan policy, providing a powerful incentive for it to maintain its links with the Taliban as a strategic asset to counter Indian influence. The findings reveal that Afghanistan has become a major "proxy" battleground for the two South Asian rivals. The paper concludes that while India's policy has been highly successful in winning it friends in Afghanistan, it has also had the unintended consequence of intensifying the security dilemma with Pakistan. This dynamic, the paper argues, is a central and tragic feature of the contemporary South Asian security landscape, where the zero-sum logic of the Indo-Pakistani conflict is played out across the wider region, with devastating consequences for the people of Afghanistan.