Independent India: Hawkish Neighbors and Few Friends

What follows is an examination of independent India under its first three leaders. All three Prime Ministers dealt with hawkish neighbors and found few friends, both in the decolonizing world and elsewhere. From its 1947 founding, India strived to be an immediate player in global affairs. Its size (a population of 350 million), storied fight for freedom, and later competition with China, attracted the attention of countless people. Because its fight for independence became a global story and foreshadowed the end of British colonialism, Indian leaders like Gandhi and Nehru wanted their nation to handle more than national issues and emerge beyond regional powerhouse; both believed India had a great deal to teach the world and lead it into a freer and more democratic age. The heart of this chapter profiles the first three Indian heads of state and the foreign policy challenges that each encountered. While no Prime Ministers’ tenure was the same, all three faced problems with Pakistan and China. All three battled poverty and famine. The three rulers wrestled with the weight of inheriting the Gandhian mantle and showing that India could offer the world something different; that the violent ways of the past were just that, the past, and that independent India would chart a new path of nonalignment and nonviolence. But all three would have to resort to violence to solve problems. The world may have changed, but how it operated stayed the same.