SYLLABUS

GS-2: India and its Neighborhood- Relations; Bilateral, Regional and Global Groupings and Agreements involving India and/or affecting India’s interests. 

Context: India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar introduced a new doctrine, SHANTI — Securing Holistic Advancement through Norms, Trust and Integrity while launching India’s campaign for a non-permanent UN Security Council seat for 2028–29.

Understanding India’s SHANTI Doctrine

• SHANTI can be understood as a logical evolution of India’s maritime outreach, building upon SAGAR and MAHASAGAR.
• While SAGAR provided the vision and MAHASAGAR expanded its geographical and strategic scope, SHANTI provides the norms and methods for translating this vision into sustained cooperation.
• SAGAR (2015) – Security and Growth for All in the Region: Established the vision of inclusive maritime security and equitable development, with emphasis on regional cooperation, capacity building and India's role as a preferred security partner and first responder.
• MAHASAGAR (2025) – Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions: Expanded this vision to the wider Indo-Pacific and Global South, recognising the interconnectedness of security and development across regions.
• SHANTI (2026) – Securing Holistic Advancement through Norms, Trust and Integrity: Introduces the method of cooperation, emphasising norms, trust, integrity, demand-driven cooperation and non-prescriptive institution-building rather than influence-driven engagement.
• A Shift in Security Approach: SHANTI seeks to move from competition to cooperation, from episodic crisis response to long-term resilience, and from protecting maritime spaces to governing shared maritime commons.

Bay of Bengal: A Proving Ground for SHANTI

• Strategic centrality: The Bay of Bengal connects India’s Act East policy with ASEAN, provides access to the Malacca Strait, and links the eastern Indian Ocean with major global trade and energy routes.
• Shared challenges: Its littoral states face common non-traditional security challenges, including cyclones, coastal erosion, fisheries management and protection of undersea communication infrastructure. This creates scope for cooperation based on shared interests rather than military competition.
• Institutional platform: BIMSTEC provides an existing regional framework connecting South and Southeast Asia. SHANTI can help align existing mechanisms rather than create another parallel institution.
• From principle to practice: The Bay is envisaged as the first region where SHANTI can be operationalised, through cooperation in maritime security, disaster response, blue economy and environmental resilience, before wider application across the Indo-Pacific.

Significance for India and the Region

• Strengthens India’s multilateral agenda: SHANTI provides a values-based framework for India’s 2028–29 UNSC candidature and reinforces its advocacy for reformed and representative multilateral institutions.
• Advances Global South interests: Its emphasis on equitable global governance, development cooperation, climate justice and inclusive growth reinforces India’s role as a voice and development partner of the Global South.
• Promotes a rules-based maritime order: By emphasising international law, peaceful dispute resolution, freedom of navigation and cooperation, SHANTI complements India’s broader maritime initiatives and strengthens cooperative security in the Indo-Pacific.
• Shifts the focus beyond hard security: SHANTI brings disaster resilience, blue economy, environmental protection and emerging technological challenges within the broader conception of maritime security and regional stability.

Challenges in Operationalising SHANTI

• Institutional fragmentation: SHANTI must coordinate with existing mechanisms such as BIMSTEC, IORA and IONS without creating another overlapping institutional layer.
• Unequal capacities: Differences in the financial, technological and institutional capacities of littoral states may constrain joint projects involving disaster response, maritime surveillance, connectivity and the blue economy.
• Geopolitical competition: China’s growing port, infrastructure and strategic presence across the Bay of Bengal littoral complicates India’s efforts to build an inclusive regional framework.
• Voluntary nature of the framework: As a normative framework rather than a binding treaty, SHANTI lacks an enforcement mechanism; its effectiveness will therefore depend on sustained political commitment and voluntary compliance by participating states.

Way Forward

• Build on existing institutions: Use BIMSTEC and other established regional mechanisms as implementation platforms rather than creating parallel structures.
• Prioritise practical cooperation: Translate SHANTI into measurable initiatives in maritime-domain awareness, information sharing, HADR, early-warning systems, maritime safety and protection of critical maritime infrastructure.
• Promote sustainable maritime governance: Integrate blue economy, fisheries management, environmental resilience and climate adaptation with maritime-security cooperation, consistent with a rules-based maritime order.
• Demonstrate success in the Bay: Establish the Bay of Bengal as a successful regional model of norms-based cooperation, creating a credible foundation for extending SHANTI to the wider Indo-Pacific.