India Rising unpacks the country’s approach to global governance by systematically considering three potential factors—ideas, interests, and institutions—that have an impact on India’s foreign policy making. The editors and contributors of this volume examine possible explanations for India’s varying compliance with global regimes and its contributions to the development and change of those regimes in areas such as nuclear non-proliferation, maritime security, counter-terrorism, cyber-governance, democracy promotion, climate change, and trade policy. The book also discusses how India is globally perceived in differing ways: as a hub of diplomatic interaction and as a difficult negotiator with a frequently inflexible stance. Looking at the prime ministerial years of Manmohan Singh and Narendra Modi’s first term, it examines India’s often ambivalent approach to global governance and foreign policy making in the backdrop of its image as a rising global power. It thus seeks to answer the primary question: What drives rising India’s conduct on the world stage?

This open access book examines the interactions between India’s economic development, agricultural production, and nutrition through the lens of a “Food Systems Approach (FSA).” The Indian growth story is a paradoxical one. Despite economic progress over the past two decades, regional inequality, food insecurity and malnutrition problems persist. Simultaneously, recent trends in obesity along with micro-nutrient deficiency portend to a future public health crisis. This book explores various challenges and opportunities to achieve a nutrition-secure future through diversified production systems, improved health and hygiene environment and greater individual capability to access a balanced diet contributing to an increase in overall productivity. The authors bring together the latest data and scientific evidence from the country to map out the current state of food systems and nutrition outcomes. They place India within the context of other developing country experiences and highlight India’s status as an outlier in terms of the persistence of high levels of stunting while following global trends in obesity. This book discusses the policy and institutional interventions needed for promoting a nutrition-sensitive food system and the multi-sectoral strategies needed for simultaneously addressing the triple burden of malnutrition in India.

While India’s prospects as a rising power and its material position in the international system have received significant attention, little scholarly work exists on India’s status in contemporary world politics. This Routledge Focus book charts the ways in which India’s international strategies of status seeking have evolved from Independence up to the present day. The authors focus on the social dimensions of status, seeking to build on recent conceptual scholarship on status in world politics. The book shows how India has made a partial, though incomplete, shift from seeking status by rejecting material power and proximity to major powers, to seeking status by embracing both material power and major power relationships. However, it also challenges traditional understandings of the linear relationship between material power and status. Seven decades of Indian status seeking reveal that the enhancement of material power is one of only several routes Indian leaders have envisaged to lead to higher status. By arguing that a state requires more than material power to achieve status, this book reshapes understandings of both status seeking and Indian foreign policy. It will be of interest to academics and policy makers in the fields of international relations, foreign policy, and Indian studies.

India is on the up. Historically derided as the lumbering elephant of Asia, this vast sub-continent has quickened its pace. The economy is booming. Tens of millions have been pulled out of poverty. Software and service companies abound. Millionaire entrepreneurs are springing up at every turn. Bollywood is going global and Indian expats are flooding back home. What's more, these changes are occurring within the world's largest democracy - a far cry from neighbouring China. But who and what lies behind India's apparent ascendency? In "India Rising" Oliver Balch takes the voices and stories of everyday Indians and presents a fresh, vivid, highly personalised account of the changes as they are unfolding. Travelling the length and breadth of the country, Balch leads readers off the tourist trail and onto the streets of modern day India. From cricket stadiums and shopping malls to rural schools and shanty towns, the book blends the best of reportage and travel writing to get under the skin of this nation in transition. What emerges is a captivating portrait of a country at a crossroads. Old versus New. Global versus local. India's march into the twenty-first century is full of tensions and uncertainties. But so too is it brimming with optimism and hope. With over half of its billion plus population under the age of twenty-five, India's future will be written by its youth. In describing their hopes and exploring their fears, "India Rising" unpicks what makes this vast nation tick and asks where it is heading.

Over the past 25 years, India's economy grew at an average real rate of close to 6 percent, with growth rates in recent years accelerating to 9 percent. Yet by 2005-06, the general government debt-to-GDP ratio was 34 percentage points higher than in the 1980s. The authors examine the links between public finances and growth in the post-1991 period. They argue that the main factor in the deterioration of government debt dynamics after the mid-1990s was a reform-induced loss in trade, customs, and financial repression taxes. Over time, these very factors plus lower entry barriers have contributed to stronger microfoundations for growth by increasing competition and hardening budget constraints for firms and financial sector institutions. The authors suggest that the impressive growth acceleration of the past few years, which is now lowering government indebtedness, can be attributed to the lagged effects of these factors, which have taken time to attain a critical mass in view of India's gradual reforms. Similarly, the worsening of public finances during the late 1990s can be attributed to the cumulative effects of tax losses, the negative growth effects of cuts in capital expenditure that were made to offset the tax losses, and a pullback in private investment (hence, growth and taxes), a situation which is now turning around. Insufficient capital expenditures have contributed to the infrastructure gap, which is seen as a constraint especially for rapid growth in manufacturing. The authors discuss ongoing reforms in revenue mobilization and fiscal adjustment at the state level, which if successfully implemented, will result in a better alignment of public finances with growth by generating further fiscal space for infrastructure and other development spending.

Could India, an emerging giant and growing geopolitical player, change the balance of power in the Indo-Pacific? “As Australia’s relationship with China has soured, probably irretrievably, India has emerged as the great new hope.” MICHAEL WESLEY The thirteenth issue of Australian Foreign Affairs examines the future of India, a rising giant whose unsteady growth and unpredictable political turns raise questions about its role and power in Asia. India Rising? explores the challenge for Australia as it seeks to improve its faltering ties with the world's largest democracy, a nation whose ascent - if achieved - could reshape the regional order. Michael Wesley interrogates the future for India and Australia - the likely challenges, opportunities and threats facing the two nations. Aarti Betigeri explores the fast-growing Indian Australian community and its potential to reshape Australia's ties to India. Snigdha Poonam examines rising anti-China sentiment in Narendra Modi's India. Harsh V. Pant reveals how India views Australia and how Canberra can supercharge relations. James Curran uncovers the origins and ambitions of the Australia-Indonesia security deal under Paul Keating. Elizabeth Buchanan looks at Australia's options as China expands its Antarctic operations. Jane Perlez analyses Australian dread about China and whether the fears are overinflated. PLUS Correspondence on AFA12- Feeling the Heat from Paul Mitchell, Elizabeth Boulton, Nicky Ison and Daniel Wild.

This book offer a fascinating new insight into the India's negotiation at the international level through the lens of the classical Sanskrit text, the Mahabharata.