Pakistan Factor in India’s Domestic Politics

Sanjeev Kumar H.M.

South Asian Survey, 2011, vol. 18, issue 1, 63-80

Abstract: Overt acquisition of nuclear weapons capacity by India and Pakistan in May 1998 signalled a tectonic shift in the nature of subcontinental conflicts. India’s military superiority in the region and its strategic depth got considerably weakened due to Pakistan’s attainment of strategic parity vis-à -vis India. In the wake of overt nuclearisation, the logic of nuclear deterrence in subcontinental security dynamics was also questioned because of continued security instability, evident in instances like the military impasse of 2001–2002. Hence, the subject of nuclearisation of subcontinental security began to capture wider spaces in the political debates in India. This strategic decision, having been taken by a coalition government, imparted enormous complexities to the domestic political exchanges over the security dynamics of the subcontinent. It also drastically transformed the nature and content of India’s domestic politics, as it brought strategic issues and foreign policy agenda of the government into the political parlance of the common people.

Keywords: India; Pakistan; security; subcontinent; nuclear weapons; nuclear deterrence; Pokhran II; domestic politics; political parties; coalition government (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0971523112469485 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:soasur:v:18:y:2011:i:1:p:63-80

DOI: 10.1177/0971523112469485

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in South Asian Survey
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().