India and Iran: A Pragmatic Alliance

By Shashank Joshi
26 Jan 2010

Entering 2010, the Iranian nuclear programme continues to plague the Obama administration. But there is one state that, although averse to a nuclear Iran, is content with the drawn-out status quo: India’s growing ties with Iran and its studied silence over the intensifying protests in the Islamic Republic seems to bear out scepticism of the view that Indian and American interests would be aligned by dint of the two states’ shared liberal democratic values. Christine Fair, a professor at Georgetown University, argues that Indo-Iranian ties reflect ‘India’s great power aspirations and New Delhi’s concomitant expansive agenda for Central Asia and beyond, within which energy is only one, albeit important, consideration’.1 Her analysis is an important corrective to those that underestimate the salience, in Indian strategic culture, of foreign policy autonomy and a diverse diplomatic portfolio.

Further Analysis: India, Central and South Asia, Middle East and North Africa, Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Strategy, Global Security Issues

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