FELLOW'S SEMINAR

Chairperson: Amb (retd) R. RajagopalanDiscussants: Dr. GVC Naidu, Amb (retd) J.C. Sharma, S.K. Mohanty, Durgesh K. Rai Highlights of the Paper Dr. Jagannath P. Panda discussed the newly emerging multilateral power politics in Asia in the context of ASEAN initiated Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the United States led Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). He… Continue reading Factoring RCEP and TPP: China, India and the Politics of Regional Integration and Coexistence

Chairman: Lt Gen Y M Bammi (Retd)External Discussants: Ambassador Preet Mohan Singh Malik and Professor Man Mohini KaulInternal Discussants: Shri Vishal Chandra and Dr Rahul Mishra Major Arguments of the Paper: The core argument of this paper is that a paradigm shift is necessary in order to take the defence relationship between Malaysia and India… Continue reading Malaysia-India Defence Cooperation: A Need for Paradigm Shift before Strategic Partnership

Chairperson: Amb Phunchok StobdanExternal Discussants: Capt Alok Bansal, Dr. D. Subachandran and Dr. Mathew JosephInternal Discussants: Dr. Smruti Pattanaik and Shri Vishal Chandra In her paper titled “Mapping the Role of External Players in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir” Dr Priyanka Singh examined the role of external actors in PoK – China, the US and the UK… Continue reading Mapping the Role of External Players in Pakistan occupied Kashmir

Chairperson: Professor S D MuniDiscussant: Shri M R Narayan Swamy and Dr N Manoharan Dr. Ashok K Behuria began the presentation by stating that this paper was largely based on the field visit to Sri Lanka. The paper studies the perceptions of a wide range of people to understand the Tamil mindset after the war.… Continue reading The State of Sri Lankan Tamil Politics in the Post LTTE Period

Chairperson: Air Marshal Anil Chopra (Retd), AVSM, VM, VSMDiscussants: Shri Gulshan Luthra and Shri Deba R Mohanty About Presentation: The paper, titled “Global Politics of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter”, analyses the ongoing debate on the issue of whether or not to continue with the programme. The author has studied the various political and economic… Continue reading Before the Cut: The Global Politics of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter

Chairperson: Lt Gen Satish Nambiar, PVSM, AVSM, VrC (Retd)External Discussants: Maj Gen (Retd) B K Sharma, Cdr Kamlesh Kumar AgnihotriInternal Discussants: Brig Mandeep Singh, Dr. Jagannath P Panda This paper discusses the factors responsible for the evolution of the Chinese military doctrine and attempts to chalk out its nuances. Its core premise is that a… Continue reading The Evolution of Chinese Military Doctrine

Chair: Air Marshal Anil Chopra (Retd), AVSMExternal Discussants: Wg Cdr Vikram Munshi, Wg Cdr Amit GoelInternal Discussants: Wg Cdr Ajey Lele, Cdr SS Parmar Major Highlights of the Paper This paper addresses the equipment and force structure required to meet external challenges 2032. The current paper is second in the series of four papers that… Continue reading Equipment and Force Structure Requirements to Meet External Threats 2032

Chairperson: Brig Rumel Dahiya (Retd)External Discussants: Lt Col Sanjay Pande, Lt Col VS Raghuvanshi and Col OP SinghInternal Discussant: Col Venu Gopal Major Highlights of the Paper: This is second paper of a research project entitled “Synergising QA for Speedy Defence Procurement and Ensuring Quality.” The first paper studied various aspects of quality assurance (QA)… Continue reading Effectiveness of Quality Assurance (QA) in Army Procurements

Open to all Members; others pl. contact 1030 to 1300 hrs Conference Cell Chair: Dr. Ashok K. BehuriaDiscussants: Prof. Riyaz Punjabi and Dr. D Subachandran, Major Highlights of the Paper: The Afghan state whose security and legitimacy is warred for and which is sought rebuilt has meagre institutional remnants indicating a direction and the case… Continue reading The Afghan War Warrants A Paradigmatic Shift for State-Building

Chair: Dr S KalyanaramanExternal Discussants: Ambassador K P Fabian, Professor Navnita Chadha Behera and Col VMB KrishnanInternal Discussants: Mr. Saurabh Mishra and Ms. Nupur Brahma The central argument of this paper is that Kautilya, the ancient strategic thinker of India, has been neglected and not been given his due in the Indian strategic thinking. It… Continue reading One Hundred Years of Kautilya’s Arthasastra

Chair: Amb. HHS ViswanathanExternal Discussants: Dr SK MohantyInternal Discussants: Ms Ruchita Beri, Ms. Shebonti Ray Dadwal Major Highlights of the Paper: This paper broadly addresses the significance of the African continent in India’s foreign policy with special reference to the Southern African Customs Union (SACU) in India’s engagement in southern and sub Saharan Africa. A… Continue reading Reframing Institutions: A Study of the Relevance of Southern African Customs Union

Chairperson: General Satish Nambiar Discussants: Lt Gen Syed Ata Hasnain, Military Secretary, Integrated Headquarters (Army), Ministry of Defence Prof. Rajesh Rajagopalan, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University. Dr. Namrata Goswami’s paper defines insurgencies as violent struggle against the state for legitimacy and influence over relevant populations. In order to win against any insurgency, the… Continue reading Counter-Insurgency Best Practices and their Applicability in the Northeast

Chairperson: Shri Vinod MisraDiscussants : Dr Selvamurthy and Shri Amit Cowshish This paper attempts to estimate the self-reliance index of India’s defence production. While estimating the index, it also focuses on three important issues; the approach towards self-reliance (as understood in the Indian context), data problems in estimating the index and the methodology used to… Continue reading Estimating Self-Reliance in India’s Defence Production

Chairperson: S KalyanramanDiscussants: Manoj Shrivastava and VS Raghuvanshi Mahendra Prasad began his presentation by focusing on his ongoing research project which attempts to unfurl various aspects of quality assurance (QA) in army procurements, an area understudied so far. He mentioned that “Quality Assurance (QA) in Army Procurements,” was the first paper in a series of… Continue reading Quality Assurance (QA) in Army Procurements

Chair: Ambassador Satish ChandraDiscussants: Maj General B K Sharma and Dr Happymon Jacob Interrogating the concept of grand strategy and whether India needs a centrally articulated design for the conduct of its statecraft constitutes the core thinking put forward by the paper. In contrast to other major states in the world, the Government of India… Continue reading Does India need a grand strategy?

Chairman: Professor Satish KumarDiscussants: Dr. Probal K. Ghosh, Cdr. Abhijit Singh The paper dealt with US efforts to counter Iran’s missile ‘threat’ and ensure security of its allies like Israel and Turkey and safeguard its interests and the regional repercussions of such measures. The paper began by discussing the Iran threat as flagged in key… Continue reading In Pursuit of a Shield:US, Missile Defence and the Iran Imperative

Chairperson: Lt Gen Satish Nambiar (Retd)Discussants: Ambassador Rajiv Bhatia and Ambassador H H S Viswanathan Reform and democratisation of the United Nations, particularly the Security Council, has been the focus of global attention in recent years. However, progress on UNSC reforms has proven to be quite elusive, mainly due to multiple and competing proposals by… Continue reading Understanding Africa’s position on UN Security Council Reforms

Chairperson: Vice Admiral P S Das (Retd)Discussants: Cdr Kamlesh Agnihotri and Dr Krishnendra Meena In order to understand the strategy adopted by China in spreading its maritime influence and implications for regional security, the tenets espoused by Alfred Thayer Mahan and Julian Corbett have been studied in this paper. The two great strategists differed from… Continue reading The Growing Chinese Maritime Influence: Implications for Regional Security

Chair: Amb. R RajagopalanDiscussants: Amb. Nalin Suri and Prof. MV Rappai China’s foreign policy is geared towards securing its ‘core interests’ such as maintaining territorial integrity, the preservation of its system of government and continued economic and social stability. Perceived threats to these core interest shape China’s external behaviour. The paper analyses important external threats… Continue reading External Threats and the Formulation of China’s Foreign Policy

Chairperson: Ambassador R RajagopalanDiscussants: Maj Gen (Retd) Ashok Mehta and Dr N Manoharan The paper focused on Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s policy towards India and on how it has been different from that of his predecessors. In evaluating the above, the scholars posed several questions like in what way his India policy has been… Continue reading Mahinda Rajapaksa’s India Policy

Chairperson: Shri Gautam H BambewalaDiscussants: Professor Sreeram Sunder Chaulia and Professor Alka Acharya The fellow paper of Dr. R. N. Das focussed on how the Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) play a critical role in India-China relations. According to him their importance is due to the persistence of ‘security dilemma’ in the India- China context. Factors… Continue reading The CBMs in Sino-Indian Relations: Need for Revamping and Enlarging the Structural and Institutional Mechanisms

Chairperson: Shri G K PillaiDiscussants: Maj Gen Dhruv Katoch and Shri Sanjoy Hazarika Dr. Namrata Goswami’s paper defines insurgencies as irregular warfare which engages in non-frontal attacks against the adversary with small groups of fighters and which is marked by the absence of fixed battlefields. Insurgencies, therefore, involve a complex mix of political legitimisation, support… Continue reading Escalation and De-escalation of Violence in Insurgencies: Insights from Northeast India

Chair: Ambassador (Retd) Ishrat AzizExternal Discussants: Professor Gulshan Dietl, Professor Qamar AghaInternal Discussants: Dr Shebonti Ray Dadwal, Dr Meena Singh Roy Dr Pradhan’s paper addresses India’s relations with Saudi Arabia, arguing that India must look beyond oil and trade in order to engage Saudi Arabia in a strategic partnership. This study also explores Indian interests… Continue reading India-Saudi Arabia Relations

Chairperson: Shri V K MisraDiscussants: Commodore (Dr) R K Rana and Commodore (Retd) Sujeet Samaddar Deliberations on Mr. Laxman Behera’s paper commenced with Chairperson V K Mishra’s opening remarks. Highlighting the performance of Indian naval shipbuilding industry in the past several years, he argued that shipbuilding industry has to acquire more strength. This is important… Continue reading India’s Naval Shipbuilding Industry: Key Gaps and Policy Options

Chairperson: Bharat WariavwallaDiscussants: Philippe Laurent, Nicolas Blarel, Krishnappa Venkatshamy and Lion Koenig This paper focuses on the concept of strategic autonomy as a defining element of the French strategic culture while demonstrating how throughout history France has shaped a bi-dimensional concept of autonomy. It emphasizes that the concept of strategic autonomy is key to gaining… Continue reading The Concept of Autonomy in French Strategic Thought

Chairperson: Shri Sheo Nandan PandeyDiscussants: Shri Anil Kumar Gautam and Cdr Kamlesh Agnihotri 1996 was a watershed year when agreements specifying the military CBMs were signed between India and China. The author argues that despite 14 rounds of talks held since then, India and China have achieved little in terms of common understanding on border… Continue reading China’s Planning on Border Infrastructure: Post 1996 CBM Period

Commander SS Parmar started his presentation by delineating the scope of the study, which was to study the menace of piracy off the coast of Somalia and in the Gulf of Aden, areas that are severely affected by the incidents of piracy in the recent past. He argued that initially pirates were more of a… Continue reading Sea Piracy and India’s Future Role

Chair: Amb (retd) R. RajagopalanDiscussants: Prof. K. R. Sharma and Mr. M. V. Rappai The core argument of Dr. Das’s paper was that the Sino-Pakistani strategic axis has gained salience in the context of the geo-politics of the cold war. It should be perceived as a marriage of convenience, contrary to what both China and… Continue reading Pakistan as a Factor in Sino –Indian Relations

Chairperson: Dr Arvind GuptaDiscussants: Lt Gen Ravi Sawhney (Retd) and Prof Kalim Bahadur Dr Pattanaik’s paper critiqued India’s existing policy towards Afghanistan and offered some recommendations for Indian policy makers on how best to engage Afghanistan in the coming days, especially in the event of the much-anticipated troop withdrawal by the United States from July… Continue reading India’s Afghan Policy: Beyond Bilateralism

Chairperson: Lt Gen Satish Nambiar (Retd)Discussants: Commodore M R Khan (Retd) and Shri Gulshan Luthra Dr. P.K. Pradhan’s paper focused on the topic of India’s defence diplomacy in the Gulf, with existing relations between India and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries as the basis for the study. Pradhan has illustrated in this study that… Continue reading India’s Defence Diplomacy in the Gulf

Chair: Lt. Gen. Satish NambiarDiscussant: Admiral Raja Menon and Sheelkant Sharma The paper presented was of a conceptual nature which adopted the offence-defence theory to analyze the character of missile defences, its impact on nuclear deterrence equations and its potential to cause security dilemma. “The paper makes two arguments: (a) Missile defences are instruments of… Continue reading Offensive Defence: Managing deterrence and arms race in a ballistic missile defence environment

Chairperson: Dr. Arvind GuptaDiscussants: Brig. (Retd.) Rahul Bhonsle, Col. Navneet Kumar, Dr. Rajiv Anantaram, Dr. Jabin Jacob Namrata Goswami’s paper focused on four alternative scenarios in 2031 with regard to China’s territorial claim on the Indian State of Arunachal Pradesh. At the outset, the author discussed the three drivers of uncertainty, which could influence the… Continue reading China’s Territorial Claim on the Indian State of Arunachal Pradesh: Alternative Scenarios 2031

Chairperson: Narendra Sisodia (DG, IDSA)Discussants: P.S. Das, Vice Admiral (retd.), Dhirendra Singh (IAS), Prof. Rajesh Rajgopalan (JNU) This paper examines civil-military relations in India and argues that it has an adverse impact on the country’s military effectiveness. Anit Mukherjee introduced the paper by trying to situate Indian civil-military relations in the theoretical construct and argued… Continue reading The Absent Dialogue: Civil-Military Relations and Military Effectiveness in India

Chairperson: Brigadier R .Dahiya (Retd), Advisor, Military Affairs Cluster, (IDSA)Discussants: Prof Anirudh Deshpande (University of Delhi) and Sqn Ldr RTS Chhina (Retd), Secretary Armed Forces Historical Research, USI of India. PK Gautam introduced the paper by saying that in India there is a knowledge gap in the pursuit of contemporary military history in the framework… Continue reading Renaissance of Military History, War and International Studies in India

Chairperson: Ambassador Ishrat AzizDiscussants: Professor Qamar Agha and Professor A K Ramakrishnan Dr. Rizvi started his presentation with the concept of velayat-e-faqih and its evolution. Velayat-e-Faqih is the most important institution in the post-revolution political system of Iran. The essence of this theory, developed and applied by Ayatollah Khomeini, is that one man with a… Continue reading The Role and Impact of Supreme Leader (Velayat-e Faqih) on Iranian Foreign Policy

Chairperson: Dr R N DasDiscussants: Professor Baladas Ghoshal and Shri C S Kuppuswamy The author analysed the developments in civil-military relations in Indonesia especially in the post Suharto era. He highlighted the fact that Indonesia charted its own civil military relation and almost defied the predetermined path laid out by theoreticians. He also argued that… Continue reading Civil-Military Relations in Post-Suharto Indonesia

Chairperson: Professor V P Dutt Discussant: Professor Mohammad Badrul Alam The broad theme of Dr. Rajaram Panda’s presentation was India-Japan economic relations, while the key focus was on the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC). At the outset, he made it clear that the paper would not attempt to examine India-Japan economic relations in detail, but only… Continue reading India-Japan Economic Relations: Focus on the DMIC

Chairperson: Dr Rajaram PandaDiscussants: Professor K V Kesavan and Professor Srabani Roy Choudhury The author tried to demonstrate Japan’s approach to India using the three characteristics that she perceived to be the central determinants of policy: 1) the international geopolitical structure, 2) elite perceptions and dominant norms, and 3) commercial and economic diplomacy. Through these… Continue reading Playing ‘catch up’: Japan’s foreign policy towards India – a case of delayed realism

Chairperson: Maj Gen Dhruv C Katoch, SM, VSM (Retd)Discussants: Shri N Manoharan & Shri M R Narayan Swamy Hemantha Dayaratne’s paper focuses on the Sri Lanka’s counterinsurgency campaign against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). In his view, the military strategy adopted by the Sri Lankan army offers an example for other countries facing… Continue reading Evolution of Sri Lanka’s Counter Insurgency Strategy 2002-2009

Chairperson: Ambassador Arundhati GhoseDiscussants: Dr Sitakanta Mishra and Dr Aditi Malhotra Dr Reshmi Kazi introduced the paper by saying that the danger of insider threats is emerging as the new nuclear threat and the risk of insider threats is invariably linked with terrorists seeking fissile materials to build a nuclear device. In the present paper,… Continue reading Insider Threat: The New Nuclear Danger

Chairperson: Professor V P DuttDiscussants: Shri Ravi Bhoothalingam & Dr Partha Mukhopadhyay The paper attempted to answer 3 key questions: What has been the quality and content of trade and investment (beyond an ostensible focus on nominal values) in the India-China dyad? Has high “economic interaction” translated to operationalization of “economic interdependence” in the India-China… Continue reading The Salience of Interdependence in India China Economic Relations, 1992 -2008

Chairperson: Ambassador Arundhati GhoseDiscussants: Ambassador K C Singh & Professor P R Kumaraswamy Rajiv began his presentation by delineating the theme of his paper. In the introduction, he noted that given the fact that Iran is part of India’s extended strategic neighbourhood, the Iranian nuclear issue has generated a lot of ‘heat and dust’. He… Continue reading India and Iran’s Nuclear Issue 2002-2010: Strategic Autonomy, Regional Stability, National Security

Chairperson: Dr G BalachandranDiscussants: Capt (IN) Alok Bansal and Dr Harinder Sekhon Dr Priyanka Singh’s present study focuses primarily on the prevailing dynamics and complexities of US aid to Pakistan, from an Indian perspective. The key issue that she tried to address in her paper was the lack of a synchronised and substantiated Indian perspective… Continue reading US Aid to Pakistan: Changing Rules of Engagement and Regional Implications

Chair: Amd. R. RajagopalanExternal Discussant: Prof. Swaran Singh and Prof. Abanti Bhattacharya The paper argues that China’s national interest, and the strategies that China follows to achieve these, are intricately linked to its priorities at the domestic level. What China defines as its core national interests are relatively stable, while the policies which are adopted… Continue reading China’s National Interest

Chairperson: Ambassador I P KhoslaDiscussants: Ambassador Dalip Mehta and Professor Mathew Joseph C Dr. Medha Bisht’s paper focused on Bhutan’s Policy shift over a period of time. In the process of explaining this broad aspect, she tried to answer questions such as: who are the actors in Bhutan driving foreign policy choices? What are the… Continue reading The Making of Foreign Policy in Bhutan

Chairperson: Shri Naveen Verma, National Security CouncilDiscussants: Professor Chintamani Mahapatra and Shri K Srinivasan The paper focuses on how United States manages its borders through the concept of “smart borders”, enhanced cross border cooperation with neighbours and utilisation of technological solutions and how far these measures are relevant to India’s approach to border management. Smart… Continue reading Managing India’s Borders: Lessons from the US Experience