South And Central Asian Studies - Research Publications
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Item Eurasia in India‘s Energy Diplomacy: Exploring the Emerging Equations in the 21st Century(Central University of Punjab, 2019) Singh, Sandeep; Singh, BawaEnergy is considered as a geopolitical commodity of political leverage/vulnerability. Also, it has been considered as a major part of diplomacy of every individual country, promoting economic prosperity or political stability. In context of Eurasia, which is known for its great amount of energy resources in the world, has become fundamentally one of the most important and geopolitical determinant of external power‘s engagements. The study argues that recent geo-economic-political developments in post-2013, and ups-downs (Russian-Ukraine Gas Wars in 2006 and 2009, diversifications of Eurasian energy supplies especially gas, and threatening relations between Europe and Russia etc.) in the Eurasian region have been posing geo-economic and geopolitical challenges to many states within the region. The Energy producers in the Eurasian region particularly Russia and CARs have started moving from the west to the East for energy supply. In addition, Asian demand for energy resources have been diversified particularly India and China are becoming big energy consumers. These changes have brought some of the serious and complex issues before India‘s domestic and foreign policies. It is also seen as a window of opportunities and possibilities of complementarities on the other hand. India as a major energy importer and it's manufacturing-oriented programmes are likely to fasten its energy demands, and Eurasia can provide an incredible opportunity to meet its energy requirements in this connection. Therefore, an attempt has been made to provide a transcontinental study of Eurasian energy as a thrust area for the present research positioning Eurasian region in Indian energy diplomacy, and determining the contours of energy diplomacy. Although, there are many researches about India‘s policy towards the Eurasian region, and few of them focussed on energy trade, and trade in other goods including political relations. But, how energy is a significant factor in India‘s diplomacy towards the Eurasian region in the present geopolitical realities has not been thoroughly investigated. In this backdrop, the present research has been approached by setting three onjectives. Fisrtly, it investigates India‘s position in the changing global energy scenario. To achieve the objective, the study exmines India‘s domestic energy policy and finds that India‘s future of domestic energy production remains clouded given the underinvestment, outdated infrastructure and under-explored basins of the country. It iv leads India to import energy. Secondly, the study has uncovered India‘s diplomatic engagements with the Eurasian region by the way of mapping its quest for energy. It concludes that India‘s energy diplomacy has a wider scope in the Eurasian region to enhance regional integration provided that the same should properly be undertaken by the stakeholder. The third objective investigates India geopolitical space in the Eurasian region. It concludes that the growing role of energy complex zone and transit countries have challenged great powers hierarchy in the region and shaped the new energy geopolitical order. The study explores that how India would create its geopolitical space in the new energeopolitical order. Thus, the research is seen as a contribution to uncover India‘s growing diplomatic space in Eurasian geopolitics from different perspectives by offering different analytical and theoretical insights from the previous studies.Item China in the Indian Ocean: Navigating India’s Challenges and Reciprocation(Central University of Punjab, 2018) Lone, Mansoor Ahmad; Singh, BawaThe Indian Ocean has remained a strategic maritime space since ages, serving as an important link among various regions of the globe regarding trade, social contacts, and cultural exchanges. The region was mostly peaceful during the pre-Vasco da Gama era, but the advent of Europeans set the stage for tough competition characterized by loot, plunder, and even wars. This foul environment kept on thriving and had prevailed till the end of the Second World War. Thereafter, the region appeared in a new refashioned scene where the USA emerged as a sole superpower of the world immediately after the collapse of its rival and competitor-USSR in 1991. The next dramatic turn arrived by the end of 20th century when the two Asian giants China and India, appeared on the global scene with swift growing economies, advancement in scientific knowledge and skilled workforce. With the onset of the 21st century, the IOR witnessed the growing attention of these big powers especially China and the USA along with the regional power India, with increasing competition because of the growing geopolitical and geo-economic significance of the region. Since the economy of these countries became heavily dependent on the energy imports mainly arriving from the Middle East and Africa and carried away through the Sea Lanes of Communications spanning the Indian Ocean from west to east, the security and safe arrival of these imports through the Indian Ocean has been treated as a chief necessity if the economy is to survive, sustain and grow. Further, the regions vast reserves of natural resource wealth both living and non-living further attracted the attention of these countries towards the region. This resulted in the ever-increasing involvement of these powers in the region. China iv having geographical constraints to easily access the Indian Ocean, started to wean India’s neighbours to make its foothold strong in the region while the USA directly joined hands with India to contain China’s expansion in the region. China expedited the process of securing greater cooperation with the littoral nations of the region, secured a goodwill place by employing different tools of maritime strategy like big investments for developing the infrastructure of these countries, increase in trade, political and diplomatic engagements, and military exchanges. China has been developing and operating many ports in the Indian Ocean countries like in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Maldives, Seychelles, Djibouti, Tanzania, Kenya. It is this increasing involvement of China where India finds herself at odds in some security perspectives. The study is an attempt to analyze the dynamics of Chinese involvement in the IOR, the possible concerns for India and India’s preparedness in response to such moves of China.Item INDIA AND CENTRAL ASIAN REPUBLICS ECONOMIC COOPERATION: AN ANALYSIS OF PROBLEMS AND POTENTIALS(Central University of Punjab, 2018) Kaur, Amandeep; Singh, BawaIndia and Central Asia have been enjoying long historical and civilizational relations since the recorded history. Due to the prominent historical links, both regions have been sharing great economic engagements as well. After coming under the imperial powers, these historical relations had been weakened and even if one says, the same had come to an end, would not be an exaggeration. With the disintegration of the former USSR, both the regions have started rediscovering each other. However, the relations between both the regions have been remained untapped and unrealized to the potentials given the internal and external dynamics. With the introduction of liberalization, globalization and privatization, Indian economy has been emerged as a potential economy. of India, it is a very peculiar situation. On the one hand, the Indian economy has growing at the faster pace but at the same time, its domestic energy is not coinciding. Moreover, India has been remained depended on Middle East Asian countries. Given, turbulence in the region, now India has been started looking towards the other regions as well. In this background, given geopolitical environment and substantial gap between production and consumption, India has been started reorienting towards the Central Asian Republics. Therefore, the present study India and Central Asia. For the first objective, Indo-CARs Economic Cooperation, the researcher has analysed the trade trends and patterns between India and CARs. The data has been taken from UNCOMTRADE database since 2000 to 2015 and have used SITC 02- digit code for all 99 commodities. It has also calculated the Hirschman Concentration also employed the gravity model to find the potential economic cooperation between both Indo-CARs. The second objective of this thesis is energy economics between India and CARs. Under this study, the researcher has examined the energy economics of India-CARs by using the empirical data from various energy database sources regarding crude oil and natural gas production/consumption as well imports and prices. The trade potential index has been measured to assess either the Central Asia will be a next future energy partner of India or not. In order to examine the third objective-geopolitical perspective, the scholar has made comparative study of China, Russia, and the U.S. with the region in terms of trade and energy cooperation and their implications for India. As far as the trends and patterns of economic cooperation is concerned, it has been found out that the trade between both the region is at the lowest ebb. The total trade between India and CARs is less than US$ 1 billion. Kazakhstan is the major trading partner of India among the CARs. The energy economics has pointed out that the total imports of oil and petroleum product by India is stood at the quantum of US$ 274 million. The comparative prices of the CARs are higher (Kazakhstan US$ 50p/b & Turkmenistan US$ 57p/b) than the other energy destinations. Thus, it is clearly indicated that CARs has not yet been a favorable energy supplier of India. However, it can be a significant energy provider of India by reducing the monopoly power of OPEC countries and other Middle East countries with competitive oil prices. The present study has also pointed out that China, Russia, and the - economic engagements with the region which have affected India energy interests in the region by introducing and implementing the various economic and energy projects. Along with the geopolitical challenges, it has also been found out that lack of connectivity and less liberalized economic policies on part of CARs are the major hurdle to realize the full potential of the economic and energy cooperation. Given these challenges, India and CARs have not been able to realize the full potential of economic and energy cooperation. However, India has been investing its investment in the direction of connectivity like INSTC and Chabahar projects. India and Central Asia have demographic dividends, large untapped markets, and institutionalized structural reforms are being putting in place. Therefore, it is anticipated that there is a huge potential for economic and energy cooperation between India and CARs.Item Indo-US Convergence of Agenda in the new Indo-Pacific Regional Security Architecture(Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd, 2020) Kumar, S; Verma, S.S; Shah, S.H.Strengthened Indo-US proximity has become a notable factor in the regional security architecture of the Indo-Pacific region, and also it raises ongoing concerns about its robustness. This article analyses the geostrategic, geoeconomic, security-related and defence-connected Indo-US relations in the region over the last two decades, highlighting the growing multidimensional convergence of US and Indian interests in the Indo-Pacific regional security architecture. In the final part, this article also sketches the future implications of Indo-US proximity and seeks to identify potential risks. -2020 SAGE Publications.Item 1951 Refugee Convention and its Protocol: Imperatives to Indian Perspective.(IMPACT, 2018) Noushadali, K; Kaushiki, NishthaBeing not a signatory to the notable International legal provisions passed for the betterment of refugees such as the United Nations Convention (1951) and protocol (1967), the Indian approach towards the refugees is worthy to do researches. It is for this reason that India responds sympathetically towards its refugee population following the principles of humanitarian considerations. Further, it is interesting to see that the Indian constitution is assuring some definite fundamental freedom to all without discriminating citizens and non-citizens. In order to preserve the fundamental freedoms of the foreigners and of course refugees (non-citizens), the Indian government had given them judicial backup too. This paper is an attempt to look at the importance of the International refugee conventions for the holistic betterment of the global refugee population. Further, the paper outlines the Indian perspectives on the global refugee laws and conventions. It also emphasizes that the Indian constitution and judiciary plays an important role in accommodating refugees, in relation to its political others, as well as ethnic affinities.Item Sino- Russo Strategic Synergy in International Politics and Emerging Contours of South Asian Equilibrium: An Indian Perspective(Institute of International Affairs, Graduate School of International Studies, Seoul National University, 2015) Kaushiki, Nishtha; Ramzan, HilalThe primary objective of this paper is to trace the shifting balance of power in favour of China in South Asia by examining the Sino-Russo entente. The trajectories of their strategic relations have gained momentum after the announcement of the ' Asia Pivot ' and the unfolding of the Crimean crisis. As their synergy is currently changing the status quo of south Asian states, the paper has attempted to explore three main factors for the same. Mos cow- Beijing-Tehran Axis; warming up of Russo-Pak ties and China 's revival of the old silk route have been analysed to examine their respective consequences in altering the balance of power. Also , India 's concerns have been addressed and some policy options have been discussed.