India in South Asia: Changing Perspectives in the 21st Century

Contents: Introduction by Sudheer Singh Verma and Ashwani Kumar. 1. Demographic Boon to Demographic Dividend: Road to Success for India/Mamta Lamba. 2. Economic Growth and Development of BRICS Countries: A Study of India/Vijay Kumar and Rakesh Kumar Gautam. 3. Big Brother Syndrome: Inter-State Conflict Among SAARC States/Bhawna Sharma. 4. Emergence of Sub-regionalism in South Asia and Role of India/Subodh Chandra Bharti. 5. China’s Interventions in the Indian Subcontinent: Challenges for Modi’s Foreign Policy/Arshad. 6. China’s Outreach in South Asia: A Threat or An Opportunity for India/Monika Gupta. 7. Sino-India Energy Diplomacy in Central Asia: Issues and Challenges for India/Raghavendra Pratap Kushwaha and Bishwajeet Prakash. 8. India’s Diplomacy in South Asia: Changing Trends in the 21st Century/Rajesh Kumar Singh. 9. Conflict in Afghanistan: A Study of Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner/Hilal Ahmad Kumar. 10. Post-9/11 India’s Role In Re-constructing Afghanistan: An Analysis/Abdul Rouf Bhat and Mudasir Mubarik. 11. Repercussion of Science and Technology on Counterterrorism/Counter-Insurgency in India/Alok Kumar. 12. Resolution or Management: What Suits South Asian Conflicts/Debendra Sahu. 13. Quest for Water: Role of China in India’s Hydropolitics in South Asia/Robinson Hembrom. 14. Water Wars in South Asia/Sandeep Kaur. 15. Cooperative Security in South Asia/Victor Sathyadas.

The twenty-first century is witnessing the first time in history, asserting two powers-India and China in Asian continent, they are attempting to bring change in global politics. India is the biggest country in the South Asian subcontinent. The other six countries are not positive about the role of India in the subcontinent. As, Bhabani Sen Gupta in 1984 described the prevalent such perspectives as “the Big Brother Syndrome”. The spatial dimensions of the present work, however, extend to the South Asian subcontinent and beyond that up to China, but the central point of the discussion revolves around India’s increasing role in cooperation and collaboration in resolving regional political and security issues. The book has captured diverse dimensions of an actor (India) such as demographic, social and cultural, economic, political, technological, and ecological, which employed for positively engaging with other actors in the region. The contributors in the book see links and convergences between their perspectives. Their perceptions of the India’s role (of an actor) reflect new openness to internal and external influences that has led to change in the existing perspectives about the actor (India) in the region (South Asia).