India and the Global South in an Age of Weaponized Trade

When I spoke today about India and the Global South, I found myself returning to a simple question: what does it mean for a nation to be independent when the things it needs every day travel across borders? Our food systems depend on fertilizers and fuel. Our industries depend on minerals, machinery and markets. A disruption at a distant port can reach an Indian factory; a rise in the price of oil can reach a household budget. Political freedom remains indispensable, but our capacity to exercise it increasingly depends on the resilience of these connections.

This is why India's engagement with the Global South deserves more than the language of solidarity. It is also a matter of national security. The countries of Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Pacific contain vital energy resources, critical minerals, markets, sea routes and people whose choices will shape the coming century. They also know what it means to have decisions about finance, technology and security made elsewhere. India can work with them to enlarge its own freedom of action while helping them enlarge theirs. That is a more demanding proposition than claiming to be their leader.

The freedom to trade without being trapped

For a long time, we were told that economic interdependence would make political rivalry less likely. Trade has indeed lifted living standards and created relationships across borders. Yet interdependence can also become an instrument of pressure. A powerful country may impose tariffs to punish another government's choices, restrict exports of a crucial input, block financial transactions or use its control over a technology to extract concessions. Trade, once imagined merely as an exchange of mutual benefit, can be weaponized.

The International Monetary Fund has documented a growing fragmentation of trade and investment along geopolitical lines. The World Trade Organization, however, warns that a retreat into rival economic blocs could make the world poorer and less secure. These observations should be read together. India's answer cannot be to close itself off from the world. It should remain open to trade while making sure that no single supplier, market, transport route or technology provider can hold its essential interests hostage.

This is the practical meaning of trade diversification. A manufacturer who buys a vital component from only one country can find production halted by an export restriction. An exporter who depends overwhelmingly on one market can suffer when that market suddenly raises barriers. A country that has several credible suppliers and customers can negotiate with greater confidence. Diversification may sometimes cost more in the short run. The additional cost is comparable to an insurance premium against a much larger strategic loss.

Recent restrictions on critical minerals make this risk visible. The International Energy Agency reported that China is the leading refiner for 19 of 20 strategic minerals it examined, with an average share of around 70 per cent. Chinese export controls on certain rare earth elements in 2025 disrupted supplies to industries that use permanent magnets. The point is not that trade with China should cease. The point is that extreme concentration gives decisions made in one capital the power to interrupt production across the world. India, which faces a difficult security relationship with China, has particular reason to understand this vulnerability.

We must also avoid replacing one dependence with another. A policy that moves every supply chain into a single friendly bloc may appear safer until that bloc changes its priorities. India's relationships with the United States, Europe, Japan, Russia, West Asia and the developing world each serve different purposes. Strategic autonomy requires the ability to work with several partners without surrendering the final choice to any of them. Trade diversification is therefore not a slogan for indiscriminate agreements. It asks us to identify where dependence is dangerous, build alternative sources, maintain reasonable domestic capacity and keep routes of commerce open.

Energy security and energy sovereignty

Energy makes the stakes immediate. India imports much of the oil it consumes. The International Energy Agency described India as the world's second-largest net importer of crude oil in 2023 and projected that import needs could grow as its economy and refining activity expand. A disruption in supply or a sharp price rise affects transport, inflation, government finances and the ordinary citizen. Reliable and affordable energy is thus a condition of both economic development and national security.

Energy security concerns the availability and affordability of energy today. Energy sovereignty goes further: it is the capacity to decide our energy future without another country exercising an effective veto. Sovereignty does not mean that every barrel of oil, solar panel or battery mineral must originate on Indian soil. No large modern economy enjoys such complete self-sufficiency. It means retaining workable choices among fuels, suppliers, technologies and routes, and having enough domestic capability to absorb a shock.

India consequently needs a layered approach. It must maintain multiple sources of crude oil and gas, adequate reserves and reliable shipping arrangements. It must strengthen domestic power generation, grids and storage. It must use energy more efficiently. It should also expand solar, wind, nuclear and other suitable sources so that rising prosperity does not automatically translate into a proportionate rise in imported fossil fuels. The IEA's assessment of Indian energy investment notes efforts to diversify the generation mix through renewables and nuclear power. Such diversification serves climate goals, but it also serves strategic independence.

The transition itself creates a fresh dilemma. Batteries, electric vehicles, wind turbines and advanced electronics require minerals and processing capacity that are highly concentrated. A country may reduce its dependence on imported oil only to become dependent on imported batteries, magnets or refining services. We should therefore ask of every energy technology: where do its materials come from, who processes them, who owns the technology, and can we repair or replace it during a crisis? Energy sovereignty requires attention to the whole chain, not only the final product installed in India.

India should pursue partnerships with mineral-rich countries of the Global South on fair terms. These countries are understandably unwilling to remain mere exporters of raw materials while others capture the greater value from processing and manufacturing. Joint ventures, local skills, responsible mining, refining capacity and predictable market access can make cooperation worthwhile for both sides. If we speak of partnership while taking resources without helping build local capabilities, we will reproduce the inequalities we say we oppose.

Why the Global South matters to this strategy

The Global South is not a single political camp. A Gulf energy producer, an African mineral exporter and a Pacific island threatened by rising seas do not share precisely the same priorities. India should not assume that a common history of colonialism gives it automatic authority to speak for them. It should instead look for interests that can be advanced together.

Consider energy. India needs secure and affordable supplies. Several partners need stable demand, investment and better infrastructure. Island states and vulnerable countries need finance for clean energy and protection from climate disasters. Through the International Solar Alliance, disaster resilience cooperation and country-specific energy partnerships, India can help connect these needs. The arrangement must remain sensitive to the different stages of development and to the fact that a quick energy transition is much harder for societies without affordable capital.

The same applies to trade. India can expand markets in Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia, but market access should flow in both directions. Better shipping links, simpler customs procedures, trusted digital payments and standards that smaller businesses can meet would do more than ceremonial declarations. Where a partner seeks to build its own pharmaceutical, food-processing or mineral industries, India should explore cooperation that creates local value. A stronger trading partner is a more durable partner.

There are already foundations. During India's G20 presidency in 2023, the African Union became a permanent member of that forum. India convened three Voice of Global South Summits from 2023 to 2024, creating a space to hear concerns often overshadowed in great-power meetings. Its proposed Global Development Compact included trade, capacity building, technology sharing and finance for specific projects. Training through ITEC, lines of credit and more recent work with the United Nations add practical instruments. None of these announcements alone proves leadership. Their significance lies in what they can help other countries actually do.

From a realist perspective, such cooperation enlarges India's bargaining power. When many countries ask for fairer climate finance, more representative institutions or reliable access to technology, their voice carries greater weight. India also gains diverse economic links and a more secure maritime environment. The aim should be reciprocal strength: countries that are less vulnerable to coercion are better placed to trade freely with one another.

The China question and the temptation of easy answers

China is an unavoidable presence in this story. Its banks and companies have financed infrastructure on a scale India cannot simply match. Many countries have welcomed Chinese projects because roads, power plants and ports answered genuine needs. China also presents itself as a voice of the developing world. Treating every partner's relationship with China as a mistake would be both inaccurate and disrespectful.

Yet Chinese dominance in mineral processing, industrial supply chains and parts of development finance creates vulnerabilities. Some lending arrangements can limit a borrower's financial flexibility. India's concern is sharpened by its own border dispute with China and by the strategic importance of the Indian Ocean. The sensible response is neither to demand that developing countries choose between India and China nor to promise that India will outspend China. India should offer a choice that partners find attractive: transparent financing, dependable completion, training, maintenance and respect for local decisions.

We should apply the same standards to ourselves. An Indian project that is delayed or negotiated without adequate consultation will not become good simply because it is Indian. If India asks others to diversify their dependencies, it must be willing to help them gain real agency. This requires patient institutions and honest evaluation. What was promised? What was delivered? Who gained the skills to run the project after the visitors left? Such questions may seem prosaic, but they determine whether a partnership survives a change of government or a diplomatic crisis.

A civilizational idea tested by material realities

India's invocation of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam, the world as one family, speaks to an aspiration that I value. It reminds us that national interests need not be pursued by denying another nation's dignity. But no family remains healthy if one member alone decides what everyone else needs. The civilizational idea becomes credible when India listens, shares knowledge without claiming ownership of every solution, and respects the independence of smaller states.

There is no conflict between this ethic and prudent statecraft. A partner that trusts India is more likely to sustain trade, cooperate at sea and stand with it on a question of institutional reform. Conversely, a grand statement about shared destiny rings hollow if an energy project never supplies power or a promised credit line never produces a functioning facility. Our credibility is built in the ordinary details of delivery.

India must invest in its own strength as well. Better manufacturing, research, universities, ports and power systems are not separate from foreign policy. They are what allow India to offer useful alternatives when a supply chain is disrupted. Domestic capacity and outward-looking partnership belong together. A country secure in its capabilities can remain open to the world without being easily coerced.

I return, finally, to the question with which I began. Independence in the twenty-first century is not isolation. It is the ability to keep choosing under pressure. Trade diversification protects that choice when commerce is weaponized. Energy sovereignty protects it when fuel, technology or minerals become instruments of leverage. Engagement with the Global South can help India achieve both, provided it also increases the choices available to its partners.

India does not need a crown as the singular leader of a diverse Global South. It needs the harder reputation of a country that listens carefully, acts consistently and helps others stand more firmly on their own feet. If it can build that reputation, its strategic interests and its civilizational imagination will reinforce one another. That would be leadership worth remembering a decade from now.

Tibet, the Dalai Lama and the Geopolitics of the Himalayas : Reflections on Dr. Lobsang Sangay’s Address at Shyam Lal College

 

Some academic engagements do not end with the conclusion of a lecture or the dispersal of an audience. They remain with us, compelling us to revisit questions larger than the immediate occasion. On 24 September 2026, as the Teacher-in-Charge of the Department of Political Science at Shyam Lal College, University of Delhi, I had the privilege of convening a seminar titled “The Geopolitics of the Dalai Lama’s Reincarnation.” What began as an academic initiative became, for me, an occasion for deeper reflection on Tibet, China, India, and the future of the Himalayan region.

We were privileged to have as our Chief Guest and keynote speaker Dr. Lobsang Sangay, Lecturer on Law and Senior Visiting Fellow at Harvard Law School and former Sikyong, or President, of the Central Tibetan Administration. His association with Delhi made the occasion particularly meaningful. Before proceeding to Harvard Law School, Dr. Sangay had studied at the University of Delhi. He subsequently served two terms, from 2011 to 2021, as the democratically elected political head of the Central Tibetan Administration. He therefore spoke not merely as an academic observer of Tibet but as someone who has spent a considerable part of his public life representing and articulating the Tibetan question internationally.

For me personally, Tibet has never been merely another subject in International Relations. I have always felt an emotional connection with the Tibetan people. Their history, their experience of exile, and their struggle to preserve their culture have remained close to my heart. I have written a detailed human rights report on Tibet while I served as the Secretary General of the Center for Democracy, Pluralism and Human Rights (CDPHR), a New Delhi-based research institute. I had the privilege of inviting Dr. Sangey as the Chief Guest at the report release event at the Constitution Club of India in 2021. Since then, Tibetan people's aspiration to exercise meaningful autonomy over their religious and cultural traditions has compelled me to engage academically with the issue. Sympathy should never become a substitute for critical academic enquiry, but scholarship need not require the abandonment of human empathy either. It is difficult to remain completely detached from the predicament of a people who have struggled for decades to preserve their monasteries, language, religious institutions and inherited traditions.

It is equally important to state accurately what the Tibetan leadership has formally sought. The Middle-Way Approach advocated by the Central Tibetan Administration does not seek Tibetan independence from the People’s Republic of China. It seeks what the Tibetan leadership describes as genuine autonomy, particularly in areas such as religion, culture, language, education, and environmental protection. The distinction is important because the Tibetan question is frequently reduced to a binary choice between Chinese sovereignty and Tibetan independence, whereas the stated approach of the Tibetan exile leadership attempts to locate a negotiated space within that debate.

Perhaps the continuing resonance of the Tibetan question became evident to me in an unexpected way after our seminar. I uploaded Dr. Sangay’s lecture to my YouTube channel so that students and others unable to attend the programme could listen to him. Within barely two days, the lecture had crossed 6,500 views, accompanied by an unusually large number of comments, likes and responses. For a channel such as mine, primarily devoted to academic lectures, discussions and public affairs, this was a rare response. I do not regard digital viewing figures as scientific evidence of public opinion, but the experience was nevertheless revealing. Something about Tibet, the Dalai Lama and the question of religious freedom had clearly touched a chord well beyond the physical audience that had gathered in our College.

The response also reminded me that Tibet is not merely an issue concerning Tibetans. Questions about a people's relationship with their homeland, their ability to preserve their religion, and their right to sustain inherited cultural institutions possess a universal human resonance. This perhaps explains why the Tibetan cause continues to attract attention and sympathy in India and in many parts of the world despite the passage of decades. The extraordinary global moral stature of the Dalai Lama has certainly contributed to that visibility, but beneath the personality lies a larger question: how does a community preserve its civilizational identity when the institutions through which that identity is transmitted become subject to extensive state regulation?

For India, Tibet carries an additional significance because it is simultaneously geopolitical, geocultural and ecological. Long before modern nation-states drew boundaries across the Himalayas, monks, scholars, pilgrims, traders, texts and ideas travelled between India and Tibet. Buddhism journeyed from India into Tibet, where it developed into one of the great traditions of Buddhist philosophy and monastic scholarship. Indian masters such as Shantarakshita, Padmasambhava and Atisha occupy an enduring place in Tibetan Buddhist memory. Much of India's Buddhist intellectual heritage that subsequently declined in its land of origin survived through Tibetan translations, commentaries and monastic traditions.

Tibet, therefore, cannot be regarded as culturally distant from India. There exists a civilizational relationship that predates the political boundaries and strategic anxieties of the twentieth century. This makes Tibet a geocultural question for India, even as contemporary developments have made it an unavoidable geopolitical one. The Himalayas were certainly formidable geographical barriers, but historically they were also bridges through which civilizations interacted. To look at Tibet only through the contemporary India-China boundary is consequently to see only one layer of a much older relationship.

Geography adds another dimension. The Tibetan Plateau and the wider Hindu Kush-Himalayan high-altitude system are often described as the “Asian Water Tower.” The region forms the headwaters of major Asian river systems and supports water security for vast downstream populations. Recent scientific research estimates that the wider Asian Water Tower sustains water resources for approximately 1.9 billion people and encompasses the headwaters of eleven major river systems.

This hydrological geography makes Tibet and the wider Himalayan region enormously consequential for India. The Brahmaputra, Indus and other river systems demonstrate how developments in the upper reaches can eventually acquire ecological, economic and strategic consequences downstream. India and Nepal are among the countries whose societies and economies are deeply connected to Himalayan river systems. Climate change, glacial retreat, changing precipitation, hydropower development and river management therefore make the ecological future of the Tibetan Plateau and surrounding mountains a matter of regional rather than exclusively domestic concern.

The terrible Himalayan disaster of August 2026 provided a painful reminder of this ecological interconnectedness. A massive collapse involving the Langtang Lirung glacier in Nepal, close to the Tibetan frontier, triggered a devastating flood and landslide. By 21 September, more than 1,400 deaths had been reported and thousands remained missing, while hydropower infrastructure and settlements suffered enormous destruction. Earlier scientific assessments pointed towards unusually high temperatures and accelerated glacier loss as important background conditions, although investigation into the precise dynamics of the catastrophe continued.

There is no credible evidence that Chinese actions caused this catastrophe, and it would be irresponsible to suggest otherwise. The more important issue is structural. A rapidly changing Himalayan cryosphere does not respect political boundaries. Scientific understanding of glaciers, river flows, extreme events and infrastructure risks therefore requires transparency, continuous observation, exchange of hydrological information and cross-border research. A recent scientific review specifically identifies enhanced transboundary coordination and data-sharing as important components of water security across the Asian Water Tower.

It is in this context that restricted external access to Tibet acquires an ecological dimension as well. The Tibet Autonomous Region remains subject to special entry requirements for foreigners, and independent foreign journalists have repeatedly faced substantial restrictions. U.S. State Department reporting covering 2023 recorded that requests by American officials for official travel to the region were not approved and that journalistic access remained tightly controlled; independent reporting also documents Tibet as uniquely restrictive compared with other provincial-level regions of China. These restrictions should not be conflated with the causes of natural disasters, but limited independent access can complicate outside observation and scrutiny of a region whose ecological changes have consequences extending across national borders.

This is why Tibet should increasingly be approached not merely as a territorial or human-rights question but also as an issue of ecological security. Scientific research shows that the Asian Water Tower is undergoing significant warming and hydrological change, with consequences for the Brahmaputra, Indus and other transboundary rivers. In an age of climate change, upstream-downstream cooperation, environmental transparency and scientific exchange are not concessions by one state to another; they are increasingly necessities imposed upon all of us by geography.

The same question of openness arises in another, very different sphere—the condition of Tibetan Buddhist religious institutions. The experiences of Larung Gar and Yachen Gar, two major centres of Tibetan Buddhist learning, have attracted considerable international concern. Human-rights organisations have documented demolitions, expulsions of monks and nuns and increased administrative controls at these institutions. Chinese authorities have explained measures at Larung Gar partly in terms of safety, overcrowding and administrative management, while human-rights organisations have regarded their scale and character as severe restrictions upon Tibetan religious life.

A monastery, however, is rarely only a physical structure. It is a repository of memory, scholarship, ritual and community. It is one of the institutional spaces through which knowledge passes from one generation to another. When the autonomy of such institutions is curtailed, what is potentially at stake is therefore not simply control over buildings or land but the ability of a civilization to preserve and reproduce its intellectual and spiritual inheritance.

This brings us directly to the subject of our seminar: why should the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama become a geopolitical issue at all? Reincarnation belongs fundamentally to the religious universe of Tibetan Buddhism. Yet the future succession of the Dalai Lama has become a matter of political contestation because two different conceptions of authority confront one another. The 14th Dalai Lama has reaffirmed that the institution will continue and has assigned responsibility for recognising his future reincarnation to the Gaden Phodrang Trust, acting according to Tibetan Buddhist traditions. Beijing maintains a fundamentally different position, asserting that the reincarnation must comply with Chinese law and procedures involving state approval.

The resulting paradox is difficult to overlook: a Communist Party-state grounded officially in an atheist ideological tradition claims regulatory authority over the reincarnation of Buddhist spiritual leaders. Dr. Sangay’s explanation of this apparent contradiction was one of the most thought-provoking parts of his lecture. His argument was that Beijing is less interested in the theology of reincarnation than in the institutional authority represented by the office of the Dalai Lama.

For millions of followers, the Dalai Lama derives authority from a centuries-old religious tradition. From the perspective of statecraft, however, that same institution possesses a form of transnational influence that cannot easily be created through administrative power. The spiritual influence associated with the Dalai Lama extends beyond Tibet into the wider Himalayan Buddhist world, including regions such as Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh in India and communities in Nepal, Bhutan, Mongolia and elsewhere. Sangay therefore argued that controlling the succession process could provide Beijing with an opportunity to influence the institution itself. In his words, the objective is to “control the office of the Dalai Lama.”

There is a larger lesson here about the nature of power. Students of International Relations are accustomed to understanding power through armies, economies, technology, territory, and material capabilities. Yet legitimacy itself is a form of power. Religious institutions, cultural memory and civilizational authority can transcend political boundaries in ways that armies cannot. A government may appoint an official, but it cannot automatically manufacture spiritual acceptance among believers.

If, after the present Dalai Lama, two competing processes eventually produce rival claimants, one recognised through the Tibetan Buddhist process identified by the present Dalai Lama and another approved by Beijing, the resulting contest could extend far beyond two individuals. It would potentially become a contest over religious legitimacy, Tibetan identity and political authority, with consequences throughout the Himalayan Buddhist world. The geopolitics of reincarnation is therefore, at its deepest level, also a geopolitics of legitimacy.

It was in this context that Dr. Sangay connected the Dalai Lama question with what has popularly become known as China’s “Five Fingers” strategy. According to this metaphor, Tibet constitutes the palm of a hand, while Ladakh, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh constitute its five fingers. Sangay related this strategic imagination to developments such as Doklam, Galwan and continuing Chinese claims concerning Arunachal Pradesh.

An important qualification is necessary. The formulation is frequently attributed to Mao Zedong, but its documentary provenance is disputed. Interestingly, Dr. Sangay himself acknowledged during his address that one cannot readily identify an official speech or document in which Mao articulated the doctrine precisely in these terms. Recent academic scholarship has similarly questioned whether a formally articulated Maoist “Five Fingers strategy” ever existed. Serious academic writing must distinguish between a useful geopolitical metaphor and a historically authenticated state doctrine.

Yet uncertainty about the phrase does not make the underlying geography irrelevant. Tibet occupies an extraordinary strategic position overlooking the Himalayan arc. Ladakh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh possess very different histories and political circumstances and cannot simply be grouped together. Nevertheless, China's relations, territorial disputes and strategic activities across the Himalayan region make the geography itself worthy of sustained attention.

Sangay went further. China, he argued, now possesses substantial economic, political or strategic influence beyond the traditional “five fingers,” including in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and the Maldives. With characteristic rhetorical flourish, he described the contemporary environment as one of “ten fingers.” This too should be understood as Sangay’s geopolitical metaphor, not as an officially declared Chinese strategy. Yet the question behind it deserves reflection: as Chinese influence expands across India's continental and maritime neighbourhood, how should India conceptualise the changing strategic environment around itself?

Perhaps the most important observation Sangay made that morning was also one of the simplest: if one wants to understand China, one must understand Tibet. I found myself returning repeatedly to this statement. India has understandably invested considerable intellectual energy in studying China from the perspective of Beijing that includes its Communist Party, economy, military, foreign policy and global ambitions. But perhaps India also needs to understand China from the Himalayas inward.

Tibet offers a vantage point from which borders, water, culture, religion, security and state power converge. Yet Tibetan studies remain far less prominent in Indian academic institutions than their strategic significance would warrant. During his lecture, Dr. Sangay suggested that institutions such as the University of Delhi should devote greater academic attention to Tibetan studies. For students of Political Science and International Relations, such study would hardly be antiquarian. Tibet brings together almost every major theme of our discipline: sovereignty and autonomy, power and legitimacy, territory and identity, ecology and security, religion and politics, civilization and statecraft.

As I reflected upon the seminar afterwards, I realised that our title, “The Geopolitics of the Dalai Lama’s Reincarnation”, contained within it a much larger question: Who has the right to preserve and interpret a civilization? Can political authority manufacture religious legitimacy? Can a modern state determine the succession of a spiritual institution when the community of believers locates that authority elsewhere? And what happens when an institution developed through centuries of religious tradition becomes entangled in the strategic calculations of powerful states?

My own conviction is that religious communities ought to enjoy the space to preserve their traditions and institutions without coercive political interference. Tibet reminds us that the survival of a civilization cannot be measured merely through control over territory. Civilizations live through languages, monasteries, texts, rituals, teachers and collective memories. And, above all, through the freedom of one generation to transmit its inheritance to the next. This is why the autonomy of religious institutions matters and why the question of the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation cannot be dismissed as an obscure theological controversy.

It is also why Tibet matters so profoundly to India. It matters because of the Himalayas and India's security; it matters because of rivers, glaciers and ecology; and it matters because a significant part of Tibet’s religious and intellectual inheritance grew from an ancient civilizational dialogue with India. Understanding Tibet need not imply hostility towards China, nor should scholarship become a substitute for diplomacy. It means recognising realities that geography and history have placed before us. Dialogue is indispensable in international relations, but dialogue is strengthened, not weakened, by historical awareness, cultural literacy, ecological knowledge and strategic clarity.

The seminar at Shyam Lal College began for me as an academic initiative undertaken in my responsibility as Teacher-in-Charge of the Department of Political Science. It ended as a deeper reflection on the relationship between power and civilization. The unexpected response to Sangay’s lecture after I uploaded it online only reinforced that impression. A discussion that began inside a college auditorium travelled within days to thousands of viewers. Perhaps that response itself tells us something: despite the enormous changes in world politics, Tibet has not disappeared from public consciousness.

Dr. Lobsang Sangay’s address reminded us that the future of the Dalai Lama cannot be understood simply by asking who will be recognised as his reincarnation. Behind that question lies another: who will possess the legitimacy to make that recognition meaningful? Behind even that lies the larger question of Tibet itself, its people, its monasteries and religious traditions, its glaciers and rivers, its civilizational memory and its place in the strategic geography of Asia.

Perhaps, therefore, Sangay’s proposition deserves to be remembered: to understand China, we must understand Tibet. I would add that to understand Tibet, we must look beyond political maps. We must understand its people and monasteries, its mountains and rivers, its religious traditions and civilizational memories. Only then can we comprehend why the succession of a Buddhist spiritual leader has become an issue of international politics, and why the future of Tibet remains inseparable from the geopolitics, ecology and civilizational future of the Himalayas.

Merit Morality and the Making of Viksit Bharat

 

“The destiny of India is now being shaped in her classrooms.” These memorable words of the Kothari Commission remain as relevant today as they were six decades ago. Classrooms, universities and examination halls are not merely places where knowledge is imparted and academic ability is assessed. They are spaces in which the future of the Republic is quietly shaped. The quality of education influences the quality of citizenship, while the credibility of examinations determines whether young citizens continue to believe in the fairness of public institutions.

India today stands at a historic juncture. As the nation moves towards the goal of Viksit Bharat by 2047, public discourse understandably focuses on economic growth, modern infrastructure, technological advancement, defence preparedness and India’s expanding global influence. These are indispensable dimensions of national development. Yet beneath these visible achievements lies another foundation that is less tangible but equally vital: the moral credibility of our institutions.

A nation does not become truly developed merely because its economy expands or its cities acquire impressive infrastructure. It becomes developed when ordinary citizens believe that honesty will be rewarded, merit will be respected and justice will be delivered without fear or favour. Institutional trust is among the most valuable forms of national capital. Once weakened, it cannot easily be restored.

 

The recurring controversies surrounding examination paper leaks and other irregularities must be understood in this wider context. For millions of young Indians, competitive examinations are not simply academic exercises. They represent hope, dignity, social mobility and the possibility of transforming the circumstances into which they were born. Across villages, tribal regions, small towns and cities, families sacrifice their limited resources to educate their children. Students devote some of the most productive years of their lives to preparation, believing that disciplined effort and ability will determine their future.

When an examination paper is leaked, therefore, it is not merely a confidential document that is compromised. The faith of students is violated. The sacrifices of parents are devalued, and the moral compact between the State and its young citizens is weakened.

Paper leaks should consequently not be treated as routine administrative lapses or ordinary criminal offences. They are organised assaults on merit. They allow manipulation to prevail over sincerity, influence over ability and dishonest privilege over perseverance. Their most damaging consequence may not be the cancellation of an examination or the postponement of recruitment. It is the message conveyed to honest students that integrity may not be sufficient for success.

Such a message is particularly dangerous for India, which rightly regards its youthful population as a demographic dividend. A large young population does not automatically become a national asset. It becomes an asset only when young people receive education, opportunities and a fair institutional environment in which their abilities can flourish. If they begin to believe that corruption and connections can routinely defeat merit, the demographic dividend can gradually turn into frustration, distrust and alienation.

The anxiety expressed by students must therefore be heard with seriousness and sensitivity. Today’s youth are more informed, connected and questioning than previous generations. They compare institutions, discuss public affairs on digital platforms and expect transparency from those exercising authority. Their impatience is sometimes criticised, but impatience is not always evidence of irresponsibility. It can also reflect the aspirations of a generation unwilling to accept institutional failures that earlier generations may have tolerated silently.

Young citizens who raise difficult questions are not necessarily hostile to the State. In a democracy, they often remind the State of its constitutional responsibilities. Governments do not become weaker by acknowledging deficiencies and correcting them. On the contrary, responsiveness enhances their legitimacy. The strength of a democratic institution lies not in its ability to avoid criticism but in its willingness to learn from it.

At the same time, democratic protest carries ethical responsibilities. The Constitution protects freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, but violence and the destruction of public property cannot be justified in the name of dissent. Buses, railway stations, educational institutions and government buildings do not belong to a political party or a particular government. They are national assets created through the contributions of ordinary citizens. Their destruction ultimately harms the society whose interests a protest claims to represent.

The State, too, bears a corresponding responsibility. Law-enforcement agencies must maintain public order with restraint, professionalism and constitutional sensitivity. A mature democracy requires citizens to protest peacefully, governments to listen patiently, opposition parties to act responsibly and the police to exercise authority proportionately. Democracy is strengthened when grievances lead to reform rather than confrontation.

Stronger laws against organised examination fraud and improved security arrangements are necessary. Those who leak papers, operate criminal networks or purchase unfair advantage must face swift and credible punishment. Yet legislation alone cannot solve what is ultimately also a moral and institutional problem. Laws can punish wrongdoing, but institutions must prevent it. Institutions, in turn, are shaped by the character of the individuals who lead them.

Technology can contribute substantially to examination security. Encrypted question papers, biometric verification, digital tracking, secure distribution systems and artificial intelligence may reduce opportunities for malpractice. But technology remains a tool; it cannot replace integrity. No software can manufacture moral courage, and no algorithm can create public trust. If those entrusted with safeguarding an examination are themselves compromised, even the most sophisticated system can be manipulated.

Appointments to examination authorities, recruitment agencies and regulatory institutions must therefore be based on competence, experience, impartiality and unimpeachable integrity. Public institutions cannot command confidence unless their leadership is considered worthy of confidence. India needs public servants whom neither the attraction of office nor the rewards of corruption can purchase.

This emphasis on character is deeply rooted in India’s civilisational understanding of education. The Indian tradition did not view education solely as a means of acquiring employment. Education was also a process of cultivating self-discipline, wisdom and social responsibility. The Taittiriya Upanishad exhorts students completing their education to speak the truth, practise righteousness and remain committed to learning. Knowledge was not separated from the ethical use of knowledge.

The Bhagavad Gita similarly assigns intrinsic value to sincere action rather than to success obtained by any means. Swami Vivekananda regarded education as the manifestation of the perfection already present within the human being and consistently placed character formation at its centre. Mahatma Gandhi insisted that noble ends could not justify impure means. Dr B. R. Ambedkar recognised education as an instrument of emancipation but also warned that constitutional democracy could not survive without constitutional morality. Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya’s Integral Humanism likewise cautioned against reducing development to material prosperity alone. Although these thinkers emerged from different intellectual traditions, they converge on a fundamental truth: national progress cannot be sustained without character.

The responsibility for protecting merit does not rest with the government alone. Examination fraud survives through networks of willing participants: officials who betray confidentiality, intermediaries who organise transactions, coaching operators who seek unlawful advantage, candidates who purchase leaked papers and families that celebrate success without questioning the means through which it was obtained. If society condemns corruption only when others benefit from it but tolerates dishonesty when it serves personal interests, institutional reform will remain incomplete.

Educational institutions, teachers and parents must therefore help create a culture in which integrity is valued even when dishonesty appears profitable. The National Education Policy 2020 rightly emphasises holistic development, ethical reasoning, constitutional values and responsible citizenship. These goals should not remain confined to policy documents. Schools and universities must produce not merely successful professionals but citizens capable of strengthening the moral foundations of the Republic.

Political parties and the media also carry an important responsibility. Student anxieties should not be converted into instruments of political spectacle. The Opposition has a legitimate duty to expose institutional shortcomings and demand accountability. However, supporting students is different from inflaming their grievances for electoral gain. Similarly, governments must not dismiss every criticism as politically motivated. Responsible journalism must distinguish verified facts from allegations and illuminate public issues rather than deepen anger through sensationalism.

The vision of Viksit Bharat must ultimately be understood as more than an economic project. A developed India should be one in which the son of a farmer in Vidarbha, the daughter of a labourer in Bihar, a student from a tribal village in Bastar, an aspirant from Tamil Nadu and a young graduate from Uttarakhand all believe that their future depends upon their ability rather than their influence. It should be a nation in which honest effort carries greater value than dishonest advantage.

Roads, ports, airports and digital networks connect places, but ethical institutions connect citizens with the Republic. Character is the invisible infrastructure of a nation. Without character, institutions lose credibility; without credible institutions, democracy loses public trust; and without public trust, development loses its moral foundation.

India’s greatest strength is not merely its youth but the hope that resides within it. That hope persuades students to persevere, families to make sacrifices, researchers to innovate and citizens to participate in national life. A nation that protects this hope protects its future.

The choice before us is therefore profound. Will India become a country in which success can be purchased, or one in which success must be earned? Will influence continue to challenge integrity, or will character remain the highest qualification for public responsibility?

The answer will determine whether Viksit Bharat becomes merely an economic destination or a civilisational achievement. Only when every young Indian can confidently believe that honesty is not a disadvantage, merit is not negotiable and sincere hard work will never be rendered meaningless can India truly claim to have become a developed nation.

DUSU Elections: Let Our Universities Teach the Right Lessons in Democracy

Having taught at the University of Delhi for nearly a decade, I have witnessed the annual Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU) elections from close quarters. Every year, as the election season approaches, campuses suddenly acquire a different energy. Students discuss candidates, organisations, issues and alliances; volunteers move from classroom to classroom; candidates introduce themselves to students whom they might otherwise never have met; and, for a few days, the university becomes an unusually vibrant political space.There is much about this that deserves to be celebrated.

Universities should not produce merely degree-holders. They should produce citizens capable of thinking, questioning, disagreeing, organising and participating in public life. Student unions can provide an institutional platform through which concerns regarding academic facilities, examinations, hostels, transportation, safety, accessibility, infrastructure and numerous other aspects of university life can reach the administration. Elections provide legitimacy to those who claim to speak on behalf of students.

More importantly, for thousands of young men and women, a university election may be their first direct encounter with democracy beyond simply casting a vote in a national or state election. Here they observe candidates, listen to arguments, question representatives, campaign for causes and sometimes contest elections themselves. They learn that leadership requires persuasion and that public office ultimately depends upon the consent of those one seeks to represent. In this sense, student politics can become a nursery of democratic leadership.

Many individuals who enter public life receive their earliest lessons in organisation, public speaking, negotiation and political mobilisation during their university years. There is nothing inherently objectionable about this. Indeed, a healthy democracy requires successive generations of politically conscious young citizens. The question, therefore, is not whether universities should have student elections. I believe they should. The more troubling question is: What kind of politics are we teaching through these elections?

When the Democratic Classroom Teaches the Wrong Lessons

If university elections are a student's first practical encounter with democracy, the methods through which these elections are fought become extraordinarily important. When young people discover that an election requires enormous expenditure, fleets of vehicles, extravagant displays of strength, thousands of printed materials, intimidation, defacement of public property, or the mobilisation of resources inaccessible to an ordinary student, we must ask ourselves what lesson they are taking from democracy. Are we teaching them that an election is a contest of ideas—or a demonstration of financial capacity? Are we teaching them that leadership means persuading fellow students—or displaying power? Are we teaching them that public property belongs to everybody—or that an election campaign gives one temporary licence to damage it? These questions go far beyond DUSU.

As a society, we frequently lament the influence of money and muscle in electoral politics. We speak of electoral reform, transparency, accountability and cleaner politics. Yet, if some of the very practices we criticise in national politics are reproduced in student elections, we risk normalising them at precisely the stage when young citizens are developing their understanding of political life. One cannot expect cleaner politics tomorrow while quietly accepting its opposite in the political education of today.

The Lyngdoh Committee: A Reform Agenda We Already Possess

These concerns are hardly new. Following directions of the Supreme Court, the Government of India constituted a committee under former Chief Election Commissioner J. M. Lyngdoh in 2006 to examine student union elections. Its recommendations subsequently acquired considerable importance in regulating university elections. The underlying philosophy of the recommendations remains remarkably relevant: student elections should remain democratic while also remaining genuinely student elections.

Among other safeguards, the framework places a ceiling of ₹5,000 on a candidate's election expenditure, requires submission of election accounts, places restrictions on printed campaign material and the use of vehicles, and lays down academic and attendance requirements for candidates. Delhi University's own election framework continues to incorporate these principles.

The Supreme Court has described the Lyngdoh Committee recommendations as “very salutary in nature” and reiterated that student elections should broadly be conducted in accordance with them.

The importance of the ₹5,000 expenditure ceiling lies not merely in the amount involved. Its underlying democratic principle is far more important: economic resources should not determine access to student leadership.

A university student from an ordinary family should be able to contest an election against a student from an affluent background without believing that the contest has already been decided by their respective financial capacities.

That is democratic equality in its most elementary form.

The Problem of Enforcement

Unfortunately, the existence of rules does not automatically create a democratic political culture.

The events surrounding DUSU elections in recent years have repeatedly brought this gap between rules and practice before the courts. During the 2024 elections, the Delhi High Court intervened over widespread allegations of defacement of public property. Counting of votes was delayed, and the Court subsequently required remedial action before permitting the process to proceed.

The issue has resurfaced dramatically during the 2026 DUSU elections. On September 18, the Delhi High Court expressed concern over reported violations involving vehicle cavalcades, weapons and other misconduct. The Court issued notices to 140 candidates, prohibited victory processions following the results and called upon the authorities to take action against violations. Delhi Police informed the Court that 49 vehicles had been impounded, more than 5,400 challans issued and four persons arrested in connection with election-related violations.

These developments should concern everyone associated with higher education, irrespective of which student organisation one supports.

The issue is not about one candidate, organisation or ideological persuasion. It is about the political culture our universities collectively permit.

Make Issues, Not Spectacle, the Centre of Elections

DUSU elections can become considerably more meaningful if we shift their centre of gravity from spectacle to debate.

Imagine an election in which candidates are primarily known for their positions on student issues: quality of teaching and learning, libraries, affordable accommodation, women's safety, accessibility for students with disabilities, mental well-being, sports facilities, public transportation, scholarships, examination reforms, digital infrastructure and opportunities for research and employment.

Why should the strength of a candidate be measured by the number of vehicles accompanying a procession? Why not by the strength of the manifesto?

Why should walls speak through posters when candidates themselves can speak through structured debates?

Delhi University possesses the intellectual resources to develop a much richer electoral culture. Colleges and departments could facilitate moderated candidate interactions. Manifestos could be placed on common digital platforms. Expenditure statements could be publicly accessible. Candidates could participate in issue-based debates. Students could question them directly about their promises.

Technology makes inexpensive campaigning easier today than it was when the Lyngdoh Committee submitted its report two decades ago. Social media, university portals, common digital noticeboards and officially organised debates can dramatically reduce the perceived need for expensive physical campaigning.

At the same time, enforcement must become credible. Rules that exist only on paper eventually undermine respect for rules themselves. Election authorities, university administrations, colleges, student organisations and candidates all have responsibilities. Violations should attract consequences that are predictable, timely and impartial.

Political Parties and Student Organisations Also Have a Responsibility

Student organisations, including those associated with larger ideological or political traditions, have contributed to political debate and mobilisation on Indian campuses for decades. The Delhi High Court recently reiterated that political parties themselves should not interfere in DUSU elections, while distinguishing such interference from a student's membership of a student organisation associated with a political tradition.

The larger responsibility, however, is cultural rather than merely legal.

Senior political organisations should resist the temptation to treat university elections as miniature versions of national electoral contests. Students require space to develop leadership organically. The purpose should be to identify articulate, socially sensitive and intellectually grounded young leaders—not merely those who can command the greatest resources or mobilise the largest spectacle.

Democracy Must Begin with Democratic Values

There is a larger paradox here.

We want our national politics to become cleaner, less dependent upon money and muscle, more transparent and more responsive to ordinary citizens. But such a political culture cannot suddenly emerge when a person reaches Parliament or a Legislative Assembly. Political habits are cultivated much earlier.

A university election is therefore not an insignificant annual campus event. It is an exercise in democratic socialisation.

The young student contesting an election today may become a legislator, minister, civil-society leader, academic, journalist, administrator or simply an engaged citizen tomorrow. The habits that we encourage at eighteen or twenty can shape attitudes towards public life for decades.

That is why I would never argue for the abolition of student elections merely because excesses occur during them. Doing so would amount to treating the symptom by eliminating an important democratic institution.

The answer to bad electoral practices is better electoral practices, not less democracy.

Let our students contest elections. Let them campaign passionately. Let them disagree. Let ideological traditions compete. Let them organise, debate and mobilise. Let them experience both victory and defeat.

But let them also learn that democracy has rules; that public property deserves respect; that political opponents are not enemies; that leadership does not require intimidation; and, above all, that an ordinary student without money or muscle possesses exactly the same democratic right to seek representation as someone backed by formidable resources.

If universities are indeed nurseries of democracy, the responsibility before us is greater than conducting elections successfully.

We must ensure that the democracy our students first encounter is the democracy we would eventually like India to become.