Insiyah Vahanvaty is a socio-political writer, commentator and scholar. She is the author of The Fearless Judge: The Life and Times of Justice A. M. Ahmadi and co-authors a fortnightly column for the Hindustan Times on constitutional debates and political life.
Nehru was then nineteen years- old. That instinct— inclusive, skeptical of ethnocentrism, and wary of majoritarian self-righteousness—was once central to India’s political imagination. That India is long gone.
Today, strands of Hindutva thinking show a disturbing comfort with the very ideas Nehru distrusted. Both Hindutva and some interpretations of Zionism elevate ethnic narratives above law, frame security in existential terms, and suppress minority rights, dissent, and civil liberties when they clash with majoritarian power. Nehru’s fear that nationalism, when fused with claims of chosen-ness, would constrict both politics and morality, has become real.
India’s global identity was once deeply tied to its own history. Having emerged from colonial rule, it spoke with courage and moral authority on issues of sovereignty, occupation, and apartheid. That clarity was most evident in its stand on Palestine. Independent India and Israel came into being less than a year apart, both born from the same post-World War moment, but with radically different moral premises.
Before 1948, Palestine was a British-administered territory with an Arab majority and a steadily growing Jewish minority driven by Zionist aspirations. Calls for a Jewish homeland, amplified by the Holocaust, culminated in a UN-backed plan to partition the land and create Israel. But this solution came at a cost: it cleaved an existing society and displaced over 700,000 Palestinians.
For India, such a solution was inseparable from the painful memory of its own devastation. Having just endured its own Partition in 1947—one of the bloodiest upheavals of the twentieth century, which claimed over a million lives and displaced nearly 15 million people—the prospect of another division along communal lines was morally indefensible. It was from this vantage that India opposed the Partition of Palestine in the United Nations General Assembly while behemoths like the United States of America and the Soviet Union together voted for the partition, and Britain presided over the proceedings. Ultimately, Israel was created, an outcome India judged as unjust to the Arab population.
India went on to become one of the first non-Arab countries to recognize the Palestine Liberation Organization and consistently supported Palestinian statehood at international forums. Its stance was not just diplomatic policy, but an extension of its own experience, shaped by anti-colonial struggle and advocacy for sovereignty. That historical memory has dimmed.
Today, India embraces Israel as a central strategic partner. This alignment persists despite mounting international condemnation of Israel’s attacks on Gaza. Allegations of war crimes against Israel’s leader and the ongoing deaths of Palestinian civilians have not altered India’s stance. In 2025, after three years of abstaining on UN resolutions demanding a ceasefire, India voted in favour of a two-state solution.
This position is evident in India’s response to the US–Israel war on Iran. Official statements speak of restraint, dialogue, and de-escalation, carefully avoiding any attribution of responsibility. What is absent is as telling as what is said: so far there has been no call for adherence to international law, no acknowledgment of civilian harm, and no naming of perpetrators.
When the conflict came uncomfortably close to home, with the United States sinking the Iranian warship IRIS Dena in the Indian Ocean days after it had participated in exercises with India, New Delhi limited itself to logistical coordination, careful to avoid any direct condemnation. Symbolic gestures too have been withheld.
The killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei went unacknowledged for 5 days after the fact. When the Indian leadership finally contacted the President of Iran after several days, it was not motivated by concern for justice or humanitarian impact, but by a domestic energy crunch caused by the blockade in the Strait of Hormuz, through which nearly 40% of India’s crude imports pass. Official sources report the conversation was to seek Iranian acquiescence for “unhindered transit of energy and goods.”
The reluctance to risk Israel’s displeasure became clear a few days ago, when the Oscar nominated film, The Voice of Hind Rajab, which documents the killing of a 6 year old Palestinian girl was blocked from release by the Indian censor board, over worries of souring India- Israel relations.
To be clear, no serious observer expects India to abandon its strategic interests. But there is a line between balancing interests and abandoning moral articulation altogether.
Strategic autonomy was meant to give India the freedom to speak independently, not the excuse to remain silent. India today maintains relationships with all sides—Iran, Israel, the United States, and Gulf monarchies. Aligning openly with Iran risks alienating the United States and Israel. Staying silent risks appearing opportunistic and morally disengaged.
These are practical concerns, but they should not eclipse a fundamental question: What does India stand for? The discomfort displayed by young Nehru over a century ago was not naïve—it was prophetic. India, which once fought centuries of colonial domination and endured rivers of blood during Partition to secure hard-won freedom, now lends support to powers pursuing the very ambitions it once resisted: territorial expansion, subjugation of populations, and the erasure of self-determination.
How bitter the irony. A country that once suffered so deeply now turns a blind eye to the pain of others. Perhaps this is history’s great tragedy.
The Tribune is committed to publishing a diversity of opinions. We’d like to hear from you. Send your articles to our email: opinion@merotribune.com.
Follow the Mero Tribune on Facebook and Twitter.
Advertisement
