India’s Security and Defence Policies: Threats, Responses and Constraints

India’s security and defence have been perhaps the most dominant theme in the discussions of its foreign policy. Security and defence, as a subset of foreign policy, understandably assume greater importance as they are directly linked with survival along with development. The present chapter looks into three questions. First, what stands as a security issue for India? Standing at 75 years, this section surveys and identifies the long-standing security issues that India continues to face. This does not only mean a security issue that India considers a threat or a risk but also security linked with control and aspiration. Second, how does India seek to resolve and deal with these security issues? This discusses India’s thinking behind its security and defence policies in responding to these long-standing challenges. Over the years, India’s security policies have arrived at a consensus of incremental internal balancing and issue-based flexible external balancing. Despite domestic turnarounds, this has been an anchor at the political level of India’s decision-making. Finally, what are the challenges in executing India’s security policies? This section points out that barring the external variables that can hardly be controlled, there are several internal factors to assess. This includes divergent perspectives within civil and military blocs of policymaking and a difference between capabilities, resources and aspirations.