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INSTC–India Breaches: the Great Wall of Pakistan

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INSTC–India Breaches: the Great Wall of Pakistan CENTRE FOR LAND WARFARE STUDIES D W LAN ARFA OR RE F S E T R U T D N IE E S C CLAWS VI N CT IO OR VIS Y THROUGH ISSUE BRIEF No. 137 May 2018 Major Kunal Kashyap is a serving army INSTC–India Breaches: officer commissioned in the Corps of Engineers and is currently posted as staff officer in a brigade. He has served The Great Wall of along the Chinese border areas of Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh. Kunal Pakistan also had a stint with the United Nations peacekeeping mission along the Israel- Lebanon border. He is a keen student of international relations. Introduction For a long time, Indian policymakers remained Key Points introverted and were guided by outer influences rather than the nation’s core interests. Post- independence, India chose to remain non- l While the entire world is caught up with the shrill aligned and her diplomatic engagements of China-led Belt and Road Initiative, India is operated in silos. The world, post-Cold War, has quietly rolling out its own co-initiated transport become level playing, increasingly multipolar corridor—the International North South Transport and embraced globalisation. During this Corridor (INSTC). period, the means of power projection also l The INSTC was initiated in 2000 by Russia, Iran changed from the erstwhile nuclear arsenals and India. It comprises a 7200-km-long multimodal and oil wells to highways, ports and renewable transportation system which shall connect the energy technology. India’s response during this Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf to the Caspian Sea period remained disjointed and half-hearted at through Iran and onwards to Russia and North best, whereas countries such as South Korea, Europe. Singapore and China, among others, witnessed meteoric economic rise on the back of their l India’s connectivity options on its west have long impetus on expanding road and port networks. been foreclosed owing to Pakistan’s stubborn China with her overcapacity in manufacturing resistance to cooperation and its control over the and colossal forex reserves has embarked on one Pakistan-occupied Kashmir—INSTC stands to of the largest projects ever undertaken under breach this wall. a nation’s aegis—the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Even the Western powers at the peak of l Chabahar Port is also inherently linked with the their colonial era could not match the scale and INSTC, and its recent operationalisation leads to grandeur of the China-led initiative. India, in this the future ‘INSTC Plus’. changed milieu, finally seems to have aligned l With INSTC, India is strongly pushing the ‘Look herself with the necessities of the changing West policy’, and its rolling out is a watershed world. While the entire world is caught up with event for its diplomatic engagements. the monstrous BRI, India is quietly rolling out its own co-initiated project—the International North South Transport Corridor (INSTC). Away The Centre for Land Warfare Studies (CLAWS), New Delhi, is an autonomous think-tank dealing with national security and conceptual aspects of land warfare, including conventional and sub-conventional conflict and terrorism. CLAWS conducts research that is futuristic in outlook and policy-oriented in approach. Website: www.claws.in Contact us: [email protected] D W LAN ARFA OR RE F S E T R U T D N IE E S C CLAWS V IC ON 2 TO ISI RY H V CLAWS THROUG INSTC–India Breaches ... from the glare, serious diplomatic parleys and economic Tokyo and connects South Korea, China, Hong Kong, heavy lifting is under way to make the project see the South East Asia, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal light of the day. This paper aims to study the various (BBIN), Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran to the border aspects of the INSTC which is bound to have far- between Turkey and Bulgaria, west of Istanbul, where reaching implications for India and the region. it joins with the European route E80. Indian Context Kaladan Multimodal Transport India’s geographic location has scripted perfection. Long Kaladan Multimodal Transport is a network of shipping, warm water coastline sits atop one of the world’s busiest inland water and road communications. The longest sea routes. Landmass of India’s west is contiguous with among them is the shipping segment from Kolkata to energy-rich nations while its east has the Tiger nations Sittwe Port in Myanmar. India has already completed buzzing with economic activities. The significance of constructing Sittwe Port in the restive Rakhine State of the region can be gauged from the geopolitical necessity Myanmar. The extension of the Aizawl-Saiha National of coining a new terminology—‘The Indo-Pacific’. Highway of 90 km to the international border at However, due to a slew of reasons India has failed Zorinpui at the Indian side is also nearing completion. monumentally to capitalise on its geographic dividends. The four-laning of 300-km Aizawl-Tuipang highway is The energy-rich growing markets of West and Central also nearing realisation. Asia have always been elusive due to the Pakistan wedge. The South Asian region has the infamous tag Military Infrastructure in Seychelles of being the least integrated region in the world, which India and Seychelles recently signed a revised agreement certainly is India’s own failing. While India was timely that may allow India to build military infrastructure in charting the contours of Look East Policy, it failed to on the Assumption Island for the Seychelles People’s convert promises into deliveries. Defence Forces. This agreement, however, is now shrouded in controversy. Reorientation Underway The dismal state of integration with both the Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport, Sri Lanka neighbourhood and the adjacent region forced India is set to pay approximately $300 million for a joint policymakers to reorient their world view and shrug venture granting it a 40-year lease over the nearly 2000 off snail-pace development. The erstwhile non-aligned acre space in Southern Sri Lanka. nation is now working tirelessly to intertwine with the neighbourhood and beyond. It would be worthwhile to Asia–Africa Growth Corridor take note of the key developments in the past few years. India and Japan announced their co-envisioned project Asia–Africa Growth Corridor at the 52nd Annual India–Myanmar–Thailand (IMT) Trilateral Highway Meeting of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Work is progressing well on this approximately summit in May 2017. The corridor shall focus on creating 1400-km-long highway which shall link India with new sea corridors linking the African continent with South East Asia by land and is expected to boost trade, India and other countries in South and South East Asia. business, education and tourism ties among the three nations. As per recent remarks by the Union Minister, It is evident that India is leaving no stone unturned to Nitin Gadkari, the project is likely to get operational by stamp its influence in the vicinity and beyond. However, December 2019.There are plans to extend the trilateral the litmus test for the success of India’s policy shift highway to Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. shall occur in its turbulent ‘West’, where it has been long stuck in the Pakistan predicament. India is now South Asian Sub-Regional Economic Cooperation investing an enormous amount of diplomatic, strategic (SASEC) Road Project and economic currency on the ‘INSTC’—which aims to The seven-member SASEC was formed in 2001 breach the great wall of Pakistan. comprising India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, The International North-South Transport Corridor Nepal, Sri Lanka and Myanmar. The forum focuses on road infrastructure to improve regional connectivity Having gained a perspective on the urgency placed on between Bangladesh, Nepal and India and connect it connecting India with others, it is pertinent to take a with the Asian Highway network, which starts from holistic look at the most vital of them all—the INSTC. D W LAN ARFA OR RE F S E T R U T D N IE E S C CLAWS V IC ON TO ISI 3 CLAWS RY H V THROUG The project in itself is a conglomeration of many arsenal. The sanctions were only recently taken off. subprojects, both existing and new. The project was Second, this transport corridor is disjointed and includes initiated way back in 2000 and ratified in 2002 by Russia, various subprojects requiring bilateral and multilateral Iran and India with an aim of establishing the shortest agreements, apart from funding issues which mired the transportation network among the member states project. Unlike the BRI, where China is doing the bulk and enhancing connectivity with landlocked Central of heavy lifting and herding the project, there was no African Republic (CAR). Later, it was joined by another helmsman for the INSTC. The two large players, India and 11 countries, namely, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia were reluctant to shoulder the responsibility for Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkey, Ukraine, Belarus, shaping and guiding the progress. The first requirement Oman, Bulgaria (as observer) and Syria. It comprises for any such project to see fruition is funding, which was a 7200-km-long multimodal (ship, rail and road) in scarce supply as none of the participant countries had transportation system which shall connect the Indian deep pockets to push the project. Ocean and the Persian Gulf to the Caspian Sea through Iran and thence to Russia and North Europe. However, changing geopolitics, Central Asia’s energy abundance, tremendous shrill created by the BRI Background acted as tailwind for INSTC. In the past few years, a lot of progress has been witnessed. Surprisingly, India The INSTC shall act as India’s gateway to expand trade has emerged as a pathfinder and has orchestrated and investment links with CAR nations and Eurasia.
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