Indian Politics & Policy Volume 1, Number 1, Spring 2018 | Page 17

Indian Politics & Policy
“exploring the scope for building coalitions
focused on global order in what is
conceivably becoming a post-unipolar
world,” 74 and which simultaneously enhances
New Delhi’s aim/preference for
evoking a multipolar world order.
Enacting the “Act East” Policy
Bolstering both strategic aims of becoming
a great power and visualizing
a multipolar world order, ordaining
the “Act East” policy has been the third
aim of the Modi government. This policy
is an extension of the “Look East”
policy first introduced under P.V. Narasimha
Rao to create deeper common
military, economic, and diplomatic
ties with South East Asia. It also builds
upon the NDA I’s assertion of India’s
“extended strategic neighbourhood,”
which sought to stretch India’s perceived
influence beyond South Asia to
find new international trade, commodity,
and energy markets to enhance India’s
economic growth and great power
ambitions. Injecting a proactive vein to
these existing policies, Act East seeks to
realize the core assumption of the twenty-first
century being the Asian Century,
as well as inter-connecting India to
the Asia-Pacific region via a recently
coined self-conception centered upon
the “nationalist-pragmatist hybrid formulation
of the Indo-Pacific.” 75 From
this basis, New Delhi has “put the whole
Indo-Pacific region at the very top of its
diplomatic priorities ... (whereby) India
step(ped) up its effort to contribute
to regional peace and stability.” 76 Via
this strategy, NDA II not only desires
“to promote Indo-Pacific regionalism
to decisively boost the Indian economy”
77 but also to establish “a security
component.” 78 In his latter regard, and
as noted in the previous section, Modi
“has moved unprecedentedly close to
the United States and to Vietnam, Japan
and Australia, ... (through a) coalition
strategy (that) is moving India away
from its traditional aversion to alliance-like
relationships.” 79
Owing to the entrenched narratives
concerning the “Indo-Pacific,”
India’s continued domination of the
Indian Ocean Region became a major
feature of the Act East policy, whereby
“India considers itself as a resident
power in the Indian Ocean” 80 as per
its cultural and civilizational pedigree.
Seeing the region as central to ensuring
its economic, military, and territorial
self-sufficiency, as well as India’s
modernization of its naval capabilities
toward a blue-water capacity, underpins
this desire and whose virtues embolden
the ability to Act East. Within
these parameters, and as a means to
counter the presence of competitors in
the region, India believes in “fostering
exclusive security relationships with
the regional states so as to promote a
favourable environment.” 81 As such,
and reiterating this strategic aim, the
Modi government has carried out sustained
and frequent diplomacy “with
a view to developing a ‘blue economy’
based on ocean resources and to promoting
dynamics of collective action
in the maritime security field,” 82 which
in 2015 included the formation of strategic
partnerships with Singapore and
Vietnam. Concerning the latter, New
Delhi has provided a US$100 million
line of credit, discussed the transfer of
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