What is Driving India's New Diplomatic Strategy with the Taliban?

In a first, India's foreign secretary met with the Taliban government's foreign minister in Dubai on 8 January.

Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri conducting a meeting with Afghanistan's Acting Foreign Minister Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi in Dubai on Wednesday, 8 January.

(Photo: X/MEA)

“You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive," remarked Sherlock Holmes to Dr Watson during their first meeting, immortalised in Arthur Conan Doyle’s debut novel, A Study In Scarlet. Although fictional, it remains a timeless symbol of the pertinent place that Afghanistan has held in our geopolitical imagination.

This was written in the context of what Captain Arthur Conolly called the ‘Great Game’, which Rudyard Kipling later popularised in his famous work, Kim. It symbolised the prolonged struggle between Tsarist Russia and Britain for dominance in Central Asia.

Afghanistan’s strategic importance, however, continues to transcend time. As its political landscape evolves, it remains a focal point for regional (in)stability. For India, Afghanistan remains a complex puzzle of opportunities and challenges that demands both caution and strategy.

India & Afghanistan: A Brief History

Apart from being a neighbouring state located at the intersection of South Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East, Afghanistan has also been a historical partner to India, which is linked through trade, culture, and shared governance. Since Independence, India has shared close ties with Afghanistan.

Following India’s Independence in 1947, diplomatic relations were established under the Treaty of Friendship, and Afghanistan was one of the few countries that opposed the entry of Pakistan into the United Nations over the Kashmir issue, primarily because of Afghanistan’s opposition to the Durand Line.

During the Cold War, India maintained strong relations with Afghanistan, especially under the leadership of President Mohammed Daoud Khan (1973-1978) and later under the Soviet-backed Democratic Republic governments under Nur Mohammad Taraki (1978-1979) and Md Najibullah (1987-1992). India provided developmental support and built robust economic and social linkages, encompassing trade agreements and developmental assistance.

With the rise of the Taliban and the advent of civil war in the 1990s, or what has been called the beginning of ‘The Second Great Game’, relations between the two soured as India refused to recognise the Taliban regime after it took power in 1996 and refrained from establishing formal diplomatic ties with them.

While India continued to show resistance against Afghanistan being used as a land to launch terror attacks in India, engagement with the Afghan people by providing humanitarian aid and advocating for peace and stability continued.

Following the fall of the Taliban in 2001, India emerged as a significant partner in reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan, especially in sectors like infrastructure, education, and health. In 2011, during a visit by the then President Hamid Karzai to New Delhi, he signed a Strategic Partnership Agreement with the then Indian Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh to enhance cooperation across various sectors, including trade and economic development, security, capacity development, and education and cultural exchanges.

Since the US withdrew from Afghanistan and the Taliban took over, India has chosen not to recognise the new regime officially.

Instead, it has taken a careful approach, supporting global calls for an inclusive government and respect for human rights. At the same time, India has kept the lines of communication open, balancing caution with pragmatism.

India's Recent Efforts to Engage with the Taliban

As India navigates its relationship with the Taliban-led government in Kabul, it steps carefully into a new chapter of regional dynamics, one with significant strategic and political implications.

The recent meeting between India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri and his counterpart Acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in Dubai was no less than an elevation in dialogue, with the Taliban calling India a ‘significant regional and economic partner’. It also signalled India’s intent to secure its interests in Afghanistan.

The discussions were held over critical issues such as trade through Iran’s Chabahar Port, which India has been developing as a significant strategic port for goods to bypass the ports of Karachi and Gwadar. India has also made its intent clear regarding prospects for future development projects in Afghanistan to respond to the “urgent developmental needs” of the Afghan people while continuing with the ongoing programmes for humanitarian assistance.

India, while responding to Afghanistan's request, has also committed to enhancing material aid for refugee rehabilitation, which has become a severe issue since the forced return of Afghan migrants from neighbouring countries, including Pakistan and Iran, placing immense pressure on fragile humanitarian infrastructure in Afghanistan, with even the UN expressing concern about their safety and dignity.

Geopolitical Factors Influencing India's Reengagement

The recent meeting highlights that a convergence of various factors will intricately shape India’s engagement with Afghanistan in the future.

Firstly, China has expanded its influence in the region. China was among the first countries to formalise diplomatic relations with the Taliban-led government and, in September 2023, reified its stance by appointing an ambassador to Kabul and subsequently receiving a Taliban representative as ambassador to Beijing in 2024.

China has also deepened its economic involvement in Afghanistan, such as the $540 million investment deal signed by Xinjiang Central Asia Petroleum and Gas Company (CAPEIC) with the Taliban to extract oil from the Amu Darya basin in 2023, thereby becoming the first significant energy extraction contract with a foreign firm that Taliban 2.0 had since the takeover.

Later, in 2024, China also signalled possible tariff-free trade with Afghanistan that would provide the stagnant, though resource-rich, economy access to Chinese markets, especially for minerals like lithium, iron, and copper. Besides that, China has also expressed interest in integrating Afghanistan into its much-touted geo-strategic project, the Belt and Road Initiative. The Taliban has also shown its readiness to engage with such projects.

Another regional actor India has to contend with is Pakistan. Border disputes souring over the Durand Line, accompanied by the Taliban’s support for the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which has recently intensified its attacks within Pakistan – with the recent one being the abduction of mine workers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Pakistani forces have also been continuously conducting raids in Peshawar, Mohmand, and Karak as part of their efforts to counter the TTP. For India, this has created an opportunity to weaken Pakistan’s leverage in Kabul while ensuring that Afghan soil is not used for anti-India activities.

India must also focus on creating opportunities to strengthen its partnership with Tehran. With Iran being preoccupied with domestic challenges and tensions with Israel, India can expand its strategic options by leveraging shared concerns, including instability in Afghanistan and its adverse impact on regional security.

India should focus beyond Chabahar for further infrastructural upgrades and operationalisation of trade corridors connecting Chabahar to Afghanistan via the Zaranj-Delaram highway. However, with Iran, India has to manoeuvre its way through a rugged terrain constituting of competing interests of the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia.

A distant yet essential mutual partner, Russia, is currently bogged down by the Ukraine war. However, it has not prevented her from engaging with Afghanistan. Russia has softened its stance towards the Taliban.

The Taliban government delegation went to take part in the St Petersburg International Economic Forum in 2022, which made the headlines. Last year, Russia proposed to remove the Taliban from the banned terrorist organisation, with Vladimir Putin calling it a "necessary move".

Russia’s engagement with the Taliban, along with its growing economic ties with Pakistan, may complicate India’s security calculus, particularly concerning regional stability. This underscores the need for India to recalibrate it.

Apart from these, Turkey’s active involvement with Afghanistan and its coordination with Pakistan could also complicate regional power imbalances. Besides, Turkey has been active in delivering humanitarian aid to Afghanistan.

Reimagining Ties

Today, we require someone like Conolly, who can craft an encompassing term to encapsulate our imagination of the current situation, much like he did with the 'Great Game’.

This situation indeed demands closer observation, especially by India, given its strategic relevance. India’s cautious and pragmatic approach extends well beyond humanitarian assistance to a much deeper engagement at the bilateral and multilateral levels.

In recent years, India has already leveraged multilateral forums like the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO Summit, 2021 and SCO RATS, 2022) to address regional concerns stemming from developments in Afghanistan. Similarly, India is also looking to engage more with Central Asian Republics, like the India-Central Asia Joint Working Group on Afghanistan, established in March 2023.

Therefore, to conclude, the significance of Afghanistan today doesn’t lie in the scars of its history but in its enduring importance as a crucial player in the region’s future and our strategic imagination.

(Pulkit Buttan is a PhD Scholar at the School of Development Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)