Why India is reaching out to the Taliban now

India’s most recent political visit to the Taliban government in Afghanistan demonstrates a significant change in how it views the region’s complex geopolitical realities.

This comes more than three years after India suffered a major strategic and diplomatic blow when Kabul fell to the Taliban.

Two years of funding in Afghanistan’s politics were quickly undone thanks to military education, scholarships, and location projects like building its new legislature. Additionally, the collapse created new security problems and increased regional adversaries ‘ influence, particularly Pakistan and China, which were eroding India’s position of authority.

However, last month signalled a change. The highest level of communication between India’s top diplomat Vikram Misri and acting foreign secretary of the Taliban Amir Khan Muttaqi took place in Dubai, which was highest since Kabul’s collapse. The Taliban expressed interest in boosting political and economic ties with India, calling it a” major regional and economic strength.”

Speaks reportedly focused on boosting business and utilizing Iran’s Chabahar interface, which India has developed to pass Pakistan’s Karachi and Gwadar ports.

How important is this appointment? According to Michael Kugelman of the Wilson Center, an American think-tank, Delhi has then given the Taliban administration the de facto validity it has sought from the international community since its return to power.

The fact that this therapy is coming from India, a country that has never previously had friendly ties with the Taliban, makes this both major and political, he claims.

Since the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan, countries have adopted varied approaches toward the regime, balancing diplomatic engagement with concerns over human rights and security. China, for example, has gone far: it has actively engaged with the Taliban, focusing on security and economic interests, and even has an ambassador in the country.

No nation has officially recognized the Taliban state, but off to 40 nations have political or casual relationships with it.

That’s why professionals like Jayant Prasad, a former American embassy to Afghanistan, are more careful about India’s awareness.

He claims that India has communicated with the Taliban through a member of the foreign company for the past three decades. India had its embassies in Afghanistan shut down in the 1990s after the civil war ended, and they were reopened in 2002. ” We didn’t need this break to develop]again], so we wanted to join. It is very just a move up in connections”, he says.

India has “historical and civilisational ties” with Afghanistan, Foreign Minister S Jaishankar told parliament in 2023. India has invested more than $3bn (£2.46bn) in over 500 projects across Afghanistan, including roads, power lines, dams, hospitals and clinics. It has trained Afghan officers, awarded thousands of scholarships to students and built a new parliament building.

This reflects a lasting geopolitical reality. “Irrespective of the nature of the regime in Kabul – monarchical, communist, or Islamist – there has been a natural warmth between Delhi and Kabul,” The Indian Express newspaper noted.

Mr Kugelman echoes the attitude. Delhi is eager not to drop because India has an important legacy as a donation of growth and humanitarian aid in Afghanistan, he claims.

Ironically, relations with Delhi appear to be easing amid rising conflicts between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Pakistan claims that from sanctuaries in Afghanistan, the hardline Pakistani Taliban ( TTP ) is operating.

Last July, Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Asif told the BBC that Pakistan would continue attacks on Afghanistan as part of an operation aimed at countering terrorism. Days before talks between India and the Taliban, Pakistani airstrikes killed dozens in eastern Afghanistan, according to the Afghan government. The Taliban government condemned the strikes as violations of its sovereignty.

Relations have suffered a sharp drop since Kabul was overthrown in 2021, when a major Pakistani intelligence official was one of the first foreign visitors to join the Taliban regime. At the time, some saw Kabul’s slide as a tactical defeat for India.

It’s correct that Delhi does succeed in its perennial contest with Pakistan by getting closer to a crucial long-standing Muslim property that has now turned on its erstwhile patron, says Mr. Kugelman, but Pakistan is not the only factor.

There are other factors driving the engagement. According to Pakistan’s refusal to grant transit rights, India aims to improve connectivity and access to Central Asia, which it doesn’t immediately access by property. Afghanistan is crucial to this purpose, according to experts. Working with Iran on the development of the Chabahar interface would be one way to improve exposure to Central Asia via Afghanistan.

” Delhi can focus more on the Afghanistan component of this plan by speaking with the Taliban leadership, who is fully supportive of India’s programs, as they would strengthen Afghanistan’s personal trade and communication hyperlinks,” says Mr. Kugelman.

Obviously, India’s latest outreach helps improve its primary interests in Taliban-led Afghanistan: preventing terrorism threats to India, deepening connectivity with Iran and Central Asia, maintaining open goodwill through aid, and countering a struggling Pakistan.

What about the downsides?

The Taliban itself poses the greatest threat to boosting ties with them. We’re talking about a violent and brutal actor who has close ties to international terrorist organizations, including Pakistani ones, who has done little to change the world from what it was in the 1990s, says Mr. Kugelman.

India may hope that, if it maintains the Taliban, it will less likely to denigrate India or its interests, so to speak. And that may be true. Can you really trust an actor like the Taliban, in the end? As India continues to exercise caution in this complex relationship, that will be the unsettling question that will linger over it.

Mr Prasad sees no downsides to India’s current engagement with Afghanistan, despite concerns over the Taliban’s treatment of women. ” The Taliban is fully in control. Afghans won’t benefit if they allow the Taliban to continue drinking from its own juice. A little dialogue with the international community might encourage the government to change its behavior.

” Remember, the Taliban is craving for recognition”, says Mr Prasad. They are aware that this will only occur following internal reforms. Like bringing women back into public life and restoring their rights to education, work and political participation.