Background, Soviet Days, Economic and Political, Present and Defence Ties
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Background
- India had strong ties during the days of the Soviet Union
- 1971: Treaty of peace, friendship and cooperation
- Strong defence ties
- After the breakup of the SU, when Boris Yelstein came into power, he showed little interest in continuing the ideology based special relationship of the Soviet times.
- Hence, relations and cooperation during this period plummeted
- When Putin came into power, he revived the relations.
Soviet Days
- India was heavily dependent on the erstwhile Soviet Union economically as well as politically
- Trade turnover between the two countries had risen to ₹ 8000 crores (that time prices) by 1990
- India՚s exports to USSR stood at more than 16% of Indian exports
- Imports from USSR constituted 6% of the country՚s gross imports
- Soviet assistance accounted for the building of key sectors of Indian economy
- At one stage Soviet contribution accounted for
- 36% of the metal production in India
- 32% of the oil produced
- 47% of the power generating equipment
- 43% of mining equipment
- At the time of its disintegration, Soviet was the source of about 70% of India՚s defence supplies
Economic
- Soviet provided credit to India without conditionalities
- India could repay loans by exporting commodities
- Soviet exported India heavy industrial products in exchange for consumer goods
Political
- SU had been extending support to India by using veto in its favour on the Kashmir question
- sided with it when the Sino-Indian border dispute arose
- Countered American Seventh Fleet in the Bay of Bengal in 1971
- Supplied India sophisticated weapons and weapon technology
- Trained Indian personnel for setting up production facilities in the country
- India, on its part, refused to condemn SU when it invaded non-aligned Afghanistan
Post-Soviet Changes in India՚s Foreign Policy
- India lost a major destination for export and economic assistance
- India had a major shift in its foreign policy: Look East, increased cooperation with US
- India became a nuclear power. This altered India՚s position at the world stage
- There has been a rightward tendency in India՚s foreign policy
- Nehruvian consensus is perhaps not the basis of India՚s foreign policy now
- < Nehruvian consensus consisted of three pillars: socialism, secularism and India՚s leadership of the non-aligned world >
- India՚s principle of non-alignment has lost its old sway
- Increased strategic cooperation with US
- Indo-US nuclear deal
- Move towards a balanced relationship with major powers and a durable and equitable multilateral global order
- India՚s foreign policy now has a strong multilateral aspect
- Thanks to its growing economic status, India has come to acquire a key role for addressing the challenges to the revival of global economy
- India՚s stand on issues related to climate change, nuclear proliferation and global terrorism has demonstrated that it has the ability even to take a stand that is independent of the major powers
Present Ties
- Declaration of Strategic Partnership, 2000
- The two countries have expanded defence cooperation
- Political contacts have been revived through the mechanism of annual bilateral summits
- India companies have gained a foothold in Russia in the energy sector with ONGC-VL acquiring a stake in Sakhalin oil and gas field. It has also bought a Russian oil company, Imperial Energy
- They have setup multilateral forums
- The Russia-India-China (RIC) and BRIC
Defence Ties
- During Soviet days SU was the largest supplier of defence equipment՚s to India for several decades
- Russia still remains a large supplier of defence equipment to India
- Skohoi
- Mig
- Admiral Gorshkov (INS Vikramaditya)
- But the relationship has now expanded to include joint R&D, training, service to service contacts, including joint exercise
- Inter-Governmental Commission on military-technical cooperation
- Joint ventures
- Fifth General Fighter Aircraft
- Multirole transport aircraft
- Brahmos
- Sukhoi Su-30MKI (to be built by Hindustan Aeronautics)
- Ilyushin⟋HAL Tachtical Transport Aircraft
- T-50 stealth fighter
- The Farkhor Air Base in Tajikistan is jointly operated by India and Russia
- There have been some recent issues in defence cooperation though
- In May 2011, Russia cancelled joint army and naval exercises with India allegedly in response to the elimination of Mikoyan MiG-35 from the Indian ICRA competition.