It seemed that the timing of the Indian Prime Minister's visit to Russia was unsuccessful.
As Narendra Modi and Vladimir Putin embraced on the steps of the Russian president's residence in Novo Ogarevo, on the outskirts of Moscow, the Alliance summit was already underway in Washington, and a Russian missile had claimed dozens of lives, hitting a children's hospital in Kiev. "It is a huge disappointment and a crushing blow to peace efforts to see how the leader of the world's largest democracy embraces the world's bloodiest criminal in Moscow," Volodymyr Zelensky commented.
These words of the Ukrainian head of state may sum up the West's disappointment with Modi's meeting with Putin, but they cannot claim to be an objective interpretation of the logic and nature of the partnership between India and Russia. The history of bilateral relations between New Delhi and Moscow, especially since the 1970s, shows that Modi's visit to Moscow - his first in Russia since 2019 - is not really surprising, in some ways more -rather late, and steps on a serious tradition conditioned by the coincidence of the interests of the two countries. Although there are not a few partnerships that manage to preserve themselves even after the end of the Cold War, the one between India and Russia is one of the most significant. In other words, New Delhi and Moscow were friends during the bloc standoff and remained so after the collapse of the USSR.
During the Cold War, the Soviet Union saw the development of fruitful cooperation with India as a kind of response to the thawing of relations between the United States and China and a natural reaction to the closeness, political and military, between the Americans on the one hand, the Pakistanis and Iranians on the another. As one of the leaders of the Non-Aligned Movement, New Delhi was then perceived by Moscow as a partner to the Third World. In this respect, things have not changed: today Russia also supports India's ambition to become a major factor in the transformation processes in the Global South, related to the relativization of American influence in Africa and the expanding influence of China. In the face of Russia, India could count - either before or today - on support regarding the case in Kashmir and on the desire of New Delhi to become a member of the UN Security Council (which support was confirmed by the Russian state in the person of Sergey Lavrov and these days). It was Moscow that helped New Delhi develop its nuclear weapons program over the years, despite Washington's opposition.
China's role in Asia is also considered by both countries as they have a similar interest: each of them sees the other as providing opportunities to open diplomatic spaces and options for maneuvering in the continent in question, falling increasingly under the shadow of the Celestial Empire. It is for this reason that India did not react reservedly either to Russia's joint military exercise with Myanmar at the end of last year, or to the docking of Russian warships in Bangladesh, while Vladimir Putin's visit to Vietnam in June was assessed as more giving opportunities rather than hiding additional risks. But still, when it comes to the Celestial Empire, there is a conceptual difference: if Russia sees China as the main partner in the reshaped international environment, for New Delhi, Beijing remains the greatest danger to the country's national security. In a sense, it can be said that if both countries see the Chinese future on the horizon, then Moscow is moving towards this scenario and New Delhi is trying to escape from it.
It is India's resistance forces that determine the "American turn" of New Delhi, especially materializing since a decade and a half ago. This turn in Indian foreign policy is argued again as a search for additional guarantees against China and is expressed both in the deepening consolidation of the country's bilateral relations with the US and in its participation in American-constructed regional formats (such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, along with the USA, Japan and Australia). It is India that remains the most significant country in Asia that refuses to join the Chinese-dictated economic integration of the continent (in the form of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership) and rejects the prospects of participation in "One Road, One Belt". (including because the first and biggest project of this Chinese strategy, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, passes through the disputed territories of Kashmir). However, India participates, alongside China and Russia, in both the Shanghai Security Organization (although Narendra Modi did not attend the organisation's latest forum, held last week in the Kazakh capital Astana) and BRICS Plus. But India's skepticism about China's growing role in Asia, as well as Moscow's increasing dependence on Beijing, make New Delhi relativize its involvement in continental formats such as Russia-India-China (RIC).
Meanwhile, the war in Ukraine resonated with, but failed to fundamentally change, the Russian-Indian partnership.
On the one hand, due to the conflict, as well as due to Covid-19, New Delhi and Moscow have suspended their annual summits within three years. It was a period in which Modi kept a social distance from Putin rather than from the coronavirus. However, this did not prevent the Indian Prime Minister from telling his Russian counterpart twice that the war in Ukraine was not a solution for Russian security concerns (this Modi did both at the Shanghai Security Organization in 2022 and these days at his meeting with the Russian head of state). In addition, New Delhi, unlike Beijing, does not participate in supplying the Russian economy and armed forces with semiconductors and dual-use goods that are in short supply for Moscow. And Modi's visit to Russia this week prompted the following statistic to spread: India's import of Russian arms - otherwise one of the pillars of the partnership between the two countries, given the import, maintenance and joint production of military hardware - has dropped from 65% in period 2010 - 2019 to 36% as of 2020. This is indicated by the data of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
On the other hand, however, India not only does not apply economic sanctions to the Kremlin, following the example of its Western partners from the EU and the USA, but has also become one of the largest customers of Russian hydrocarbons. For example, according to other widely cited data, for the months of May and June this year, between 40%-43% of the oil purchased by New Delhi was from Moscow, and this amount is mainly contributed by the lower price of Russian energy carriers compared to those of other major Indian suppliers like Iraq and Saudi Arabia. We should also remind here that last year, when New Delhi hosted the G-20, Narendra Modi did not allow the topic of Ukraine to dominate the forum, to the hidden displeasure of the Western countries participating in the event in question.
But since China cannot compromise Russian-Indian cooperation, it is unrealistic to expect that the war in Ukraine can. Although Russia is becoming more of a Chinese court and India is trying to avoid a similar fate, New Delhi and Moscow have aligned interests in giving an infrastructural expression to their geostrategic projects. One such is the already piecemeal North-South International Transport Corridor connecting Mumbai and St. Petersburg via Iran and the Caspian Sea. The other, still existing only as a project, is to connect the Indian port of Chennai with Russia's Vladivostok, which is part of an even more ambitious concept for the development of the northern artery through the Arctic (but in which China has emerged as Russia's leading partner). These two projects interweave the geostrategic interests of India and Russia, especially since the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor announced in September last year (this is an initiative by which the US is trying to give additional logistical connectivity to the South Asian country with the allies of the Americans in the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant and the Old Continent) has not yet been specified and as a project.
However, given that the dynamics of international relations make long-term strategic planning difficult, India and Russia are adapting their partnership purposefully and thematically. Hence, the most important results of the meeting between Narendra Modi and Vladimir Putin consisted in their negotiations concerning the possible deepening of their cooperation in nuclear energy (the possibility of Moscow providing additional nuclear reactors and uranium supplies to New Delhi), as well as the development of a payment system that uses local currencies (circumventing the dollar is one of the priorities of BRICS Plus, where both countries are members anyway). However, these topics in themselves are not new in the bilateral dialogue between New Delhi and Moscow. However, given that the US is not sanctioning India - either because of the Russian C-400 anti-aircraft missile complex ordered by the South Asian country, or over Indian investments in the Iranian port of Chabahar - it would be interesting to see if New Delhi would actually take the next step: after by not applying sanctions to Russia, to participate in their circumvention.
In fact, this, not Ukraine, will be the main marker according to which it will be possible to give an analytical perspective on the way in which India reflects the clash between the West and Russia. Narendra Modi is put in a difficult situation: because of China, he is forced to stay closer to the US and not to abandon Russia. That is why he is ready to be a guest at a state dinner at the White House and to give hugs in Novo Ogarevo.