Gulbin Sultana

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Dr Gulbin Sultana is an Associate Fellow with the  South Asia Centre in the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and  Analyses (MP-IDSA), New Delhi. Her area of research in the institute includes  Sri Lanka and the Maldives. She has written extensively on the  politico-economic and foreign policy developments of these two countries.  Additionally, Dr Sultana takes interest in the study of small island states  particularly in the Indian Ocean Region and also issues pertaining to maritime security.  She has done her MPhil on “India’s Naval Support to Sri Lanka and the  Maldives” from the South Asian Studies Division of School of International  Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She was awarded a PhD degree too  by the same university. Her doctoral thesis was on “Sri Lanka Maritime  Security: A Study of Military and Non-military Responses.Before joining MP-IDSA, she worked with the  National Maritime Foundation and the United Service Institution of India in New  Delhi.


Associate Fellow

Publication

Confronting the State: ULFA’s Quest for Sovereignty by Nani Gopal Mahanta

India’s nation and state building project faces challenges in the NorthEast because of the simplistic, linear, and development-centric approach that has been guiding it so far. This neglects the mind set and the psyche that is sustaining insurgency and violence in the region. The Indian Union has, undeniably, won the war against the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), and its support base has also reduced to a large extent.

The Prabhakaran Saga: The Rise and Fall of an Eelam Warrior , by S. Murari

V.Prabhakaran, the man who took up arms at the age of 17 and led one of the world's most ruthless terrorist organisations to realise the dream of the Tamil Eelam, died in the final battle with the Sri Lankan forces in May 2009, leaving behind Tamils who are a disillusioned and demoralised ‘nation’. The end of the war established the writ of the Sri Lankan state and re-established Sinhala hegemony. S. Murari, in his book The Prabhakaran Saga: The Rise and Fall of an Eelam Warrior, depicts the Prabhakaran era in the history of Sri Lanka's ethnic conflict in an objective manner.

Mahinda Rajapaksa’s India Policy: Engage and Countervail

Mahinda Rajapaksa has emerged as perhaps the only Sri Lankan leader who has managed to secure some strategic autonomy in conducting his country's foreign policy vis-à-vis India. He engaged India effectively during the military campaign against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and simultaneously countervailed India by improving his country's relationship with India's traditional adversaries such as China and Pakistan. In the post-LTTE scenario, he has maintained a defiant posture vis-à-vis India over the latter's persuasion to evolve a political solution to the ethnic issue.