Page 61 - K M PANNIKAR and The Growth of a Maritime Consciousness in India

RISE OF THE PACIFIC: GEOPOLITICAL CONTESTATIONS IN
THE INDIAN OCEAN IN THE 20 -21 CENTURY
ST
TH
Maritime affairs in the Indian Ocean Region have undergone a paradigmatic
transformation, particularly since the beginning of the 21st Century. Perhaps
the most significant transformation has been the re-christening of the Indian
Ocean Region to Indo-Pacific. India’s reckoning and emergence as a responsible
maritime actor and stake-holder in the Indo-Pacific geopolitical order has
enthused and necessitated the development of alliance relations with major
regional and extra-regional powers.Facilitated by the outreach of India’s ‘Act
East’, Indo-Pacific policies, Indo-Pacific Oceans’ Initiative and the rejuvenation
of the QUAD (Quadrilateral Security Dialogue), the most significant extra-
regional power, the United States (US) has promoted the evolution of a concert
of “like-minded” partners, in an attempt to balance China’s hegemonic
overtures and geo-political contestations. It is in this context of a volatile
maritime Indo-Pacific order that the paper attempts to situate the emerging
trends in Indo-US maritime engagement, with the converging traits of the
Indo-Pacific policies of New Delhi and Washington forming the pedestal for
securitising the maritime domain. This analysis will be conducted within
the wider perspective of K. M. Panikkar’s vision of securitising the Indian
Ocean, which he acknowledged as having a major influence on shaping India’s
maritime history and the importance of oceanic control for the future of India;
the imperative of alliance relations for India as an Indian Ocean power, since
he envisioned that the oceanic policy for India would be possible only in the
closest collaboration with the major stake-holders, implying the prospects
of cooperative security; and conclude with a reference to the relevance of
his doctrine vis-a-vis the contemporary maritime dynamics in the Indo-
Pacific littorals.

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