As India celebrates its 78th Independence Day, the world has undergone profound changes since its independence on 15 August 1947, and so has India’s position on the global stage. From a Eurocentric world order characterised by bipolarity and later unipolarity, the world today has become multipolar, with India emerging as one of the key poles. While debates continue over India’s precise standing in the global hierarchy—whether it is a great power, major power, rising power, or emerging power—there is no doubt that India is a significant global player. Challenges remain in enhancing India’s domestic capabilities and global influence, and the path to achieving these goals remains a critical policy issue for the country today. As Prime Minister Narendra Modi has articulated, India has entered the Amrit Kaal (the era of elixir) and must work towards achieving the goal of Viksit Bharat (Developed India) by 2047, when it will celebrate the centenary of its independence.
One of the key pathways towards achieving the goal of Viksit Bharat is through greater global engagement to enhance its hard power and soft power appeal. Over the years, New Delhi has pursued this with renewed vigour. Since the Cold War era, the policy of non-alignment in Indian foreign policy has evolved towards multi-alignment, focusing on engaging with all great powers, middle powers, and the immediate and extended neighbourhood. Alongside deeper engagement with the US, Russia, and Europe, strategies such as ‘Neighbourhood First’, ‘Look East’, and ‘Look West’ have become central to this approach. While some of these policies date back to the post-Cold War recalibration of Indian foreign policy, under Prime Minister Modi, there has been greater clarity and purpose in both the planning and execution of foreign policy, with the Prime Minister himself taking an active interest in diplomatic matters. As a result, India’s engagement with the world has witnessed significant growth, enhancing its global status and appeal.
The Middle East has been a notable focus of India’s increased global engagement. The region has become one of the key areas where India’s diplomatic, political, economic, and cultural interactions have grown exponentially since 2014. The Middle East, particularly the Gulf region comprising the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states—Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates—as well as Iran and Iraq, is India’s extended neighbourhood to the West. It is crucial for India’s energy security and its strong business ties with the Arabian Peninsula, in addition to being home to nearly 10 million Indians who live and work in the GCC states. The region’s geostrategic importance is further underscored by its proximity to crucial international maritime routes in the western Indian Ocean, which connect India to Africa and Europe. Moreover, security concerns in the naval domain and the fight against terrorism make the Gulf and the wider Middle East even more significant for India.
In addition to conventional engagement with regional countries, India has adapted to the changing geopolitical dynamics of the Middle East. This means prioritising engagement with emerging regional powers, particularly Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Iran, Qatar, and Israel. While these countries form the core of India’s engagement in the Middle East, India has also maintained active relations with other regional states, including Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Turkey, Oman, Bahrain, and Morocco. India’s engagements in the region have primarily occurred in four domains: politics and diplomacy, the economy, security, and culture.
Political and Diplomatic Engagements
India’s political and diplomatic engagements with Middle Eastern powers have increased exponentially in recent years, and New Delhi has managed to achieve this without compromising its neutrality in regional politics. This is no small feat, as most global powers have struggled to maintain such a balance in their dealings with the often fractious Middle East. The region’s geopolitics are characterised by four major centres of power: the Saudi Arabia-United Arab Emirates-Egypt axis, Iran, Israel, and the Turkey-Qatar axis. These power centres have interacted in various ways, often confrontationally, especially since the Arab Spring. While India does not take sides in these geopolitical conflicts, it has succeeded in maintaining good relations with all significant players without compromising its neutrality. Whether during the Qatar crisis, the tensions between Israel and Iran, Saudi Arabia and Iran, or Turkey and Egypt-UAE, India has consistently advocated for regional peace and stability while fostering strong bilateral relations with each of these countries.
India’s Diplomatic and Political Engagement in the Middle East
India’s diplomatic and political engagement in the Middle East has focused on avoiding regional geopolitical entanglements. This approach is evident in India’s response to the Israel-Hamas war, which was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on 7 October 2023. India unequivocally condemned the terrorist attack, emphasising that assaults on innocent civilians, anywhere in the world, for any cause or by whomever, are condemnable and should be considered acts of terrorism. Based on this principle, India also defended Israel’s right to undertake defensive military action to neutralise threats to its security. However, as the war continued and the civilian death toll in Gaza mounted, New Delhi nuanced its position to underscore the need for a humanitarian ceasefire and to express its explicit support for Palestinian statehood, while opposing the expansion of Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories. India has also refrained from making statements during occasions when Israel and Iran engaged in a war of words or directly attacked each other, advising all sides to exercise restraint and avoid further escalation. This balanced position has helped India avoid being perceived as taking sides in a way that could harm its engagement with the broader region.
India’s economic engagement with the Middle East has become a cornerstone of its foreign policy. The region, India’s largest trading bloc, offers vast opportunities in areas such as energy, technology, and defence, underscoring the importance of these bilateral relationships
Economic and Commercial Ties
Economic engagement with regional countries remains the most crucial pillar of India-Middle East relations. The region is India’s largest trading bloc globally, and there is immense potential for growth in trade and business ties, especially with the GCC countries. Besides traditional areas of energy imports and trade in food products and jewellery, bilateral economic engagements have expanded to include greater flows of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), increased footprints of Indian businesses in the dynamic Gulf market, and newer areas such as tourism, entertainment, sports, recreation, defence trade, renewables, power, and start-ups. Economic and commercial ties have rebounded to pre-pandemic levels after the disruptions caused by COVID-19. Diplomatic and commercial engagements during the pandemic were notable in strengthening bilateral relations. In 2022, India and the UAE signed a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, while talks for the India-GCC FTA have been revived. Additionally, India is making strides in engaging in multilateral connectivity projects, including its continued investments in and partnership with the Chabahar Port project in Iran and participation in the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC). India has also enthusiastically joined the quadrilateral framework of I2U2 (India, Israel, UAE, and the US), focusing on greater technological and economic engagement for food and energy security and sustainable growth.
Security Cooperation
Security remains a key focus of India’s engagement with the Middle East, with four major areas of emphasis: counterterrorism, maritime security, military-to-military ties, and defence manufacturing. In this regard, there has been increased engagement among military officials from India, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Israel, and Egypt in a bilateral format. New Delhi has also engaged more closely with Tehran and Doha since the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Taliban’s return to power in Kabul. Additionally, there is greater synergy with Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE in defence trade and exploring the possibilities for joint manufacturing. Increased military-to-military cooperation has led to regular joint exercises between the three services with the UAE and Saudi Arabia. With shared threats in the maritime domain, India and the Gulf countries remain deeply engaged in maritime cooperation, with India becoming an observer to the Bahrain-based Combined Maritime Forces in 2021 and acquiring full membership in 2023. The fourth important facet of security cooperation is counterterrorism, which has grown significantly since the 2008 Mumbai attacks, with substantial collaboration in preventing the spread of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and addressing the potential security fallout of the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan.
Security remains a critical focus of India’s Middle Eastern strategy, with heightened cooperation in counterterrorism, maritime security, and defence. By forging closer ties with regional powers like Saudi Arabia and the UAE, India is strengthening its security posture while contributing to regional stability
Cultural Collaborations
India’s cultural collaborations with the Middle East have grown exponentially in recent years. Countries in the region have embraced yoga, and India has promoted ancient Indian meditation and physical well-being practices. Furthermore, the Gulf countries have been forthcoming in recognising the importance of facilitating and establishing places of worship for Indians living and working in the Gulf. In February 2024, Prime Minister Modi inaugurated the Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS) Temple in Abu Dhabi. There is also increasing engagement in sports, entertainment, and education between India and the Gulf states. As countries like Saudi Arabia open up to cinema and other recreational activities, there are greater opportunities for collaboration between Bollywood and the emerging cinema industry in the Gulf kingdom. The Indian film industry already has a strong presence and collaboration with other regional countries, especially the UAE. India and the UAE have developed intricate relations in sports like cricket, and discussions are underway to enhance cooperation in higher education, particularly in emerging areas such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and space exploration.
Takeaways
The Middle East is one of the most important regions globally, given its geostrategic location, rich energy resources, and centrality in the Islamic world. Consequently, the region has always attracted the attention of global powers. In today’s multipolar world, the Middle East has seen the emergence of several middle powers playing important roles in international politics. As a rising inclusive global power, India has invested significant diplomatic and political energy to enhance its engagements with the Middle East without taking sides in regional geopolitics. This balanced approach has allowed India to maintain and strengthen relations with key Middle Eastern powers. The region remains vital to international politics, the economy, and security, and to India’s interests, thus acquiring central importance in Indian foreign policy in the twenty-first century.
-The writer is an Associate Professor of Middle East Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Views are personal.
