India and the Antarctic Treaty System: Realities and Prospects

Abstract

India feels proud of its scientific as well as diplomatic achievements in regard to the Antarctica — the most forbidding terrain on ourterra firma, a significant ‘natural laboratory’ as well as an object of innovative political experiment in international control and cooperation. With as many as five successful expeditions to this multi-faceted and multi-dimensional continent, a permanently manned scientific stationDakshin Gangotri and a coveted and enviable “consultative status” in the Antarctic Treaty System, India's presence on Antarctica is well established. The Indian entry into the elitist Antarctica Treaty System (hereafter cited as ATS) and its innermost circle has added a new dimension to the geopolitics of Antarctica. It has also highlighted and reiterated, in a significant way, India's resolve to have a meaningful and effective say in the management of Antarctica and its so far untapped resources. Demonstrating its scientific maturity and political farsightedness, India has started investing in Antarctica with an eye to future returns. However, the entire issue of India-Antarctica interaction is not as it is often projected and portrayed by the press and elsewhere. Antarctica no doubt has just dawned in the realm of Indian consciousness and not many in the country possess much politico-geographic awareness about this frozen bottom of the earth where a subtle interaction between geography and politics has lately assumed significant dimensions and far reaching implications. And what we fail to grasp is the complexity of the geopolitical realities of the Antarctica and the political implications of India's presence as a consultative member within the ATS. We tend to isolate Indian interests and objectives from the general backdrop of the Antarctica political scenario and try to study them in isolation. The present essay is born out of the necessity to critically examine the Indian goals in Antarctica, irrespective of whether they are scientific, economic or political in the light of the following assumptions. Firstly, India joined the Antarctic Treaty System at a ‘critical’ juncture and at a particular ‘point’ of the evolution of the Antarctic political field and hence cannot remain insensitive to or unaffected by its problems and complexities. Secondly, while examining the Indian interests and objectives in the Antarctic we should focus our attention on the ‘role’ that India decides to play on the ‘geopolitical chessboard’ within the ATS and moreover as a consultative member with rights and duties. And finally, the annual despatch of the scientific expeditions to Antarctica and the acquisition of the “consultative status” in the ATS should not be viewed as ends in themselves but to the contrary, as indispensable means to realise some crucial objectives or goals in the Antarctica. What lies before India in regard to the Antarctica issue is a difficult and changing path and a foreign policy dilemma. It is in the light of these assumptions and against the backdrop of the Antarctica's geopolitical scenario, that the present essay purports to examine Indian interests, objectives and moves in regard to the Antarctica and the Antarctic Treaty System.