India on the Russian Invasion of
Rohan Rajesh
On Saturday, February 21st, the UN Security Council voted on a resolution to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Naturally, Russia vetoed the resolution, but it was backed by 11 of the 15 members of the Security Council. One of the three countries that abstained was India. On Monday, India then abstained once more on a procedural UNSC resolution calling for a rare special emergency General Assembly session to be convened over the issue. I have previously talked about how India will continue to maintain relations with Russia even as it coordinates more closely with Western powers in the Indo-Pacific due to the perceived fickleness of American foreign policy. It must be said that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is in no way justified and violates the very first article of the UN Charter. However, India finds itself in a tricky situation.
As a matter of morality, as it were, I imagine that many Indian policymakers do not support Russia’s invasion. Indeed, Russia’s invading Ukraine to intervene on behalf of Ukraine’s Russian population will not sit well on Raisina Hill since Pakistan has been making the same argument about the Kashmiri Muslim population in India-administered Kashmir. As a matter of policy, India’s consistent position has been that states should not interfere in the internal matters of other sovereign states, a position Russia is blatantly violating. The invasion has also created a major policy headache for New Delhi as there are more than 18,000 Indian students in Ukraine who are stranded and scrambling to escape the violence; at least one Indian student was killed as he was waiting in line to restock on food and water for his bunker.
Given the situation, why hasn’t India criticized the Russian government? As I have written previously, India still sees itself as perhaps needing to pay back Soviet loyalty in the Security Council whenever India has gone to war. Additionally, India is still dependent on Russian military equipment even as it diversifies its military purchases, as seen with its recent and controversial acquisition of the Russian S-400 air defense system. Indian students have also been able to flee the conflict through corridors suggested by Russia (though the details are sketchy and students still faced shelling as they fled through these corridors), whereas Indian refugees have been stopped by border authorities in other Eastern European countries. Finally, India does not want a great power like Russia to be nudged towards China, India’s greatest strategic threat. That said, India’s abstention sticks out like a sore thumb as a member of the Quad - an organization consisting of the US, India, Japan, and Australia whose stated goal is to “promoting a free, open rules-based order, rooted in international law to advance security and prosperity and counter threats to both in the Indo-Pacific and beyond.” With Russia clearly in violation of this principle, India’s abstention belies the official claim that the Quad is not an “anti-China” grouping (though let’s be real, it is) and necessarily leads to questions about how united its members really are.
While India did abstain from voting on the Security Council resolution, there is a real possibility that Russia’s actions could lead to India hastening its turn towards the West for the above reasons. It is also important to note that not all is hunky-dory in India-Russia relations. Russia has been tilting towards China and Pakistan as India tilts to the United States. During the Sino-Indian crisis in July 2020, Russia maintained a neutral stance. In a world increasingly pulled apart by two poles - the US and China - nuanced foreign policy stances are far more difficult to maintain, as India found out in the Cold War.
It is important to bear in mind that India’s abstention should not be taken as support for Russia’s actions. India did not condemn Russia directly, but it did call for a cessation of hostilities and, in no uncertain terms, stated that sovereignty and territorial integrity must be respected. My view is that India does not support Russia’s actions but is not willing to condemn them directly. India’s focus has always been on its immediate neighborhood, and its policy on Russia may change in the long run if supporting Russia becomes too much of a headache politically, particularly as American policymakers begin to take a more “with-us-or-against-us” view of Russia.