India at the crossroads: Autonomy or Drift?
India’s strategic ambition is clear. The country seeks autonomy—engaging with all major powers while avoiding dependence on any single one. In an increasingly multipolar world, this objective is both sensible and necessary. Few countries of India’s size and complexity can afford rigid alignment without sacrificing long-term flexibility. Yet ambition alone does not determine outcomes. Execution is also critical. Strategic autonomy is not sustained by positioning or rhetoric. It rests on economic depth, institutional credibility, and policy consistency. Without these foundations, neutrality risks being interpreted not as strength, but as indecision. In such cases, dependence emerges not by design, but by default. Autonomy as a strategy, not a slogan Strategic autonomy is often misunderstood as passive neutrality. In reality, it is an active strategy. It requires the ability to say “yes” or “no” to partnerships based on national interest, not compulsion. That ability depends on leverage. ...