(a) India continues to invoke its time-tested policy of strategic autonomy vis-à-vis both the United States of America and Russia…

(a) Strategic Autonomy: Balancing the US and Russia

India’s rejection of US mediation offers on Jammu and Kashmir—most pointedly after the May 2025 ceasefire with Pakistan, when President Trump claimed credit and offered to mediate, and New Delhi insisted that the cessation of hostilities had been agreed bilaterally between the two militaries, upholding the 1972 Simla Agreement's bilateral framework—and its deliberate refusal to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine exemplify strategic autonomy in practice. Far from passive isolationism, this policy represents dynamic engagement on self-defined terms. India has deepened security integration with Washington through the QUAD, 2+2 Dialogues, and foundational defense pacts like LEMOA (2016), COMCASA (2018) and BECA (2020) to balance China in the Indo-Pacific. Simultaneously, it preserves its time-tested partnership with Moscow, securing discounted crude oil, fertilizers, and critical defense supplies, including the S-400 system.

However, this selective autonomy entails trade-offs. Persistent reliance on Russian hardware creates strategic vulnerability amid Moscow’s growing dependence on Beijing, while India's non-aligned stance on Ukraine risks diplomatic friction with Western partners, as the additional 25 per cent US tariff imposed in August 2025 over India's Russian oil purchases showed. Nonetheless, this policy remains effective: it prevents India from becoming a frontline proxy, diversifies strategic partnerships, and maximizes policy space in an increasingly polarized international system.

(b) Preserving Multilateral Trading Order Under the WTO

The resurgence of unilateral reciprocal tariffs, notably championed under the Trump administration, directly contravenes the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Most-Favoured-Nation (MFN) principle and the tariff ceilings members have bound under Article II of the GATT, and bypasses the Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU), exacerbated by the US-engineered paralysis of the Appellate Body. To salvage the multilateral trading regime, members can pursue several institutional pathways: institutionalizing interim dispute mechanisms like the Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement (MPIA, 2020), which the EU, China and others have joined though India and the United States have not; advancing plurilateral agreements via Joint Statement Initiatives (JSIs) on digital trade and investment facilitation; and deploying critical mass negotiations that do not necessitate full consensus - although India has resisted bringing plurilateral outcomes such as the Investment Facilitation for Development Agreement into the WTO rulebook, arguing that they bypass the consensus principle.

India must balance its traditional leadership of the Global South—defending Special and Differential Treatment (S&DT) and public stockholding for food security under the G-33—with pragmatic adaptation. Having faced structural disputes over agricultural subsidies and solar localization rules, India is diversifying by concluding bilateral trade agreements with the UAE (2022), Australia (2022), the EFTA states (signed 2024) and the United Kingdom (signed July 2025). To prevent the WTO's total erosion into protectionist fragmentation, India must champion a "WTO 2.0" that bridges development flexibilities with modernized, enforceable disciplines.

(c) NonAlignment 2.0 and the Quest for Alternative Universality

The intellectual blueprint NonAlignment 2.0 (2012, formulated by Sunil Khilnani, Pratap Bhanu Mehta, and others) articulated India’s aspiration to serve as a site for an "alternative universality." Moving beyond the anti-colonial resistance of Non-Alignment 1.0, this doctrine posits India as a normative bridge between Western liberal institutions and the developmental imperatives of the Global South. Its claim rests on India's example: a poor, vast and diverse society attempting development through democracy and pluralism, which offers others a path distinct from both Western liberal templates and authoritarian developmentalism. India later echoed this civilizational framing in its G20 motto, Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam (2023), seeking a global order that accommodates ideological diversity.

Yet, a palpable tension persists between aspirational universalism and material capability. India’s capacity to anchor an alternative order remains constrained by structural economic deficits, modest defense manufacturing, and the tactical necessities of transactional realpolitik.