Strategic Analysis

India: A Sacred Geography by Diana L. Eck : Harmony, Random House, New York, 2012, 559 pp., Rs 599, ISBN 978-0-385-34708-2

India: A Sacred Geography by Diana L. Eck is an important contribution to the literature on the processes that have contributed to imagining India long before the age of the nation state. Eck traces the ‘prehistory’ of the idea of India, locating it in the geographical nature of Hindu spiritual practice and pilgrimage.

Partition of History in Textbooks in Pakistan: Implications of Selective Memory and Forgetting

This article seeks to study the post-partition and especially post-1971 experimentation with history writing in Pakistan and focuses on how the revisiting of the partition has led to a reinvention of history by the selective contraction, misinterpretation and even omission of certain periods believed to be detrimental to the process of nation building in Pakistan. The article seeks to selectively apply the Hegelian approach and make a case for a common history, which it is hoped will facilitate better relations and greater mutual understanding between the nations of the sub-continent.

Impact of West Bengal Politics on India–Bangladesh Relations

It was expected that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Dhaka in September 2011 would transform India–Bangladesh relations. However, this did not happen as India could not sign the Teesta water sharing agreement, the biggest deliverable of the visit. It also made some people brand West Bengal (Paschimbanga) Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee as a spoiler.

India’s Nuclear Limbo and the Fatalism of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Regime, 1974–1983

India's relationship with the nuclear non-proliferation regime deteriorated sharply after its 1974 underground nuclear test which, according to India, was a peaceful nuclear explosion, but which was not accepted as such by the regime. That it did not follow up with immediate weaponisation challenged the core logic of the non-proliferation regime which operates on a Murphy's Law of ‘nuclear fatalism’, i.e. if a country has the know-how to produce nuclear weapons, it will certainly produce them.

Energy Strategy for the Indian Navy: Need, Scope and a Roadmap

‘Energy’ is a key enabler of military combat power and it should be considered a strategic resource for the Indian Navy (IN). This article justifies the necessity of ensuring energy security for the IN in the backdrop of emerging energy challenges. It also discusses certain recent developments that point to the growing relevance of an energy policy for the IN. The article then discusses the contours and the scope of an integrated energy policy and proposes a roadmap for implementing an energy strategy for the IN.

Can Robust Bilateral Cooperation on Common Rivers between Bangladesh and India Enhance Multilateral Cooperation on Water Security in South Asia?

The Himalayan river system, which is made up of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers, has a combined drainage area that covers the countries of China, India, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh. The basin of the Indus river, which originates in the Tibetan plateau, is the lifeline of regions in China, Pakistan, India and Afghanistan.

China and IBSA: Possible BRICS Overreach?

The India–Brazil–South Africa (IBSA) forum, which was formalised in June 2003 through the adoption of the Brasilia Declaration based on the spirit of South–South solidarity, turns a decade old in 2013. The event will be celebrated at its first decadal summit in New Delhi. At the same time, this event needs to be juxtaposed with the fifth consecutive leadership summit of Brazil–Russia–India–China–South Africa (BRICS) in Durban in March 2013. Both IBSA and BRICS are in the limelight for their cross-continental politics.

The International Ambitions of Mao and Nehru: National Efficacy Beliefs and the Making of Foreign Policy by Andrew Bingham Kennedy

India and China represented two of the most dynamic anomalies within the international system during the height of the Cold War era in the 1950s. Both states were considered thus, as the world, particularly Western nations, looked upon their prospective futures with varying degrees of scepticism.

IBSA at 10: South–South development assistance and the challenge to build international legitimacy in a changing global order

This commentary engages with the IBSA model of South–South development assistance. It focuses on the IBSA Trust Fund to demonstrate the growing political relevance of the partnership in development assistance initiatives. This is followed by an analysis of Brazil's increasing participation in South–South development assistance in many developing countries around the world.

Twenty-First Century Sea Power: Cooperation and Conflict at Sea by Peter Dutton, Robert S. Ross and Oystein Tunsjo (eds.)

The volume under review is part of the CASS Series on Naval Policy and History edited by the acclaimed maritime affairs expert Professor Geoffrey Till, and is also the 50th book in the series. Maritime and naval scholarship is a niche area in security and strategic studies and the Cass series is a welcome initiative to address the prevailing sea-blindness and related ignorance in the policy-making circles of the world.