Groupings, treaties, chokepoints and doctrines behind India's foreign policy news. 667 concepts, each with its definition, key details and a timeline of every news story that touched it.
Bab el-Mandeb is a narrow maritime strait connecting the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian Sea, forming a critical link on the shipping route...
BrahMos is a supersonic cruise missile jointly developed by India and Russia under a 1998 agreement between India's Defence Research and Development...
A Central Bank Digital Currency is a digital form of fiat money issued by a central bank, representing a direct liability of the central bank rather than a...
Coercive diplomacy is the use of threats or limited force to persuade an adversary to change behaviour — distinct from full-scale war. It involves...
Diego Garcia is the largest island in the Chagos Archipelago and hosts a major joint US-UK military installation in the central Indian Ocean. It functions...
ECGC Limited is a government-owned export credit insurance agency under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, headquartered in Mumbai. Established on July...
Farmer Producer Organisations are legal entities formed by groups of primary producers (farmers) for collective procurement, processing, and marketing of...
Force majeure ('superior force') is a contractual clause that excuses a party from fulfilling its contractual obligations due to extraordinary events or...
A Geographical Indication (GI) is an intellectual property right that identifies a product as originating from a specific geographical location, where a...
India's 'Act East Policy,' articulated in 2014 as an evolution of the earlier 'Look East Policy' (1991), prioritises strategic, economic, and cultural...
India is the world's third-largest crude oil consumer and importer, with import dependence exceeding 85% of total crude requirements. India's energy...
India's approach to the Russia-Ukraine conflict exemplifies its multi-alignment strategy — maintaining strategic relationships with competing power blocs...
India has developed Strategic Petroleum Reserves (SPR) as a buffer against supply shocks. The Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves Limited (ISPRL), a Special...
Despite political tensions and security restrictions on Chinese FDI since 2020, India-China trade has grown significantly. India's trade deficit with China...
India and China share one of the world's most asymmetric major bilateral trade relationships, characterized by significant Indian import dependence on...
India-France defence cooperation is one of the pillars of the strategic partnership. The landmark Rafale fighter jet deal — an Inter-Governmental Agreement...
India has maintained historically cordial relations with Iran based on civilizational ties, trade, and strategic interests. The centerpiece of India's Iran...
Defence cooperation forms the most significant dimension of India-Israel relations. Israel is India's second-largest arms supplier after Russia. Cooperation...
India-Pakistan relations have historically featured cyclical crisis-escalation-partial normalisation patterns. Key escalation episodes with airspace or...
India and Russia formalised their relationship as a 'Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership' in 2010. This builds on decades of Soviet-era cooperation...
The UAE is India's third-largest trading partner and the second-largest destination for Indian exports. The bilateral relationship has been elevated to a...
Four 'foundational agreements' form the legal and operational backbone of India-US defence cooperation. These agreements, modelled on US arrangements with...
India and Iran share deep civilisational, energy, and strategic ties. Iran has historically been a significant crude oil supplier to India; however, US-led...
The term 'Indo-Pacific' reflects a geographic and strategic conception of the maritime space connecting the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean as a single...
The IPOI was launched by India at the East Asia Summit in November 2019 in Bangkok. It is a non-treaty, open, inclusive, and collaborative framework...
The International Big Cat Alliance was launched on April 9, 2023, during the 50th anniversary celebrations of Project Tiger. The IBCA is an...
Iran's nuclear program is one of the most monitored in the world by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The core question is not whether Iran can...
MGNREGS (also called NREGA) is India's flagship employment guarantee scheme, providing a legal entitlement to wage employment.
NDCs are central to the Paris Agreement's bottom-up architecture, where each country sets its own climate targets and progressively ratchets them up.
While tariff reduction gets headline attention, non-tariff barriers (NTBs) — regulatory, procedural, and standards-based measures that restrict trade — are...
India imports over 85% of its crude oil requirement, making it highly sensitive to global crude price movements. The impact of oil price increases passes...
A PHEIC is the highest alert level under the International Health Regulations (IHR) 2005, declared by the WHO Director-General on the advice of an Emergency...
Section 232 allows the US President to impose trade restrictions if an investigation by the Department of Commerce finds that certain imports threaten...
The Strait of Hormuz is the narrow waterway connecting the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the broader Indian Ocean. It is the world's most critical...
A 'chokepoint' in energy geography refers to a narrow maritime passage through which a significant share of global energy flows, creating strategic...
The Strait of Hormuz is a narrow waterway connecting the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, approximately 30 miles wide at its narrowest point. It is the...
International trade agreements exist on a spectrum of depth and coverage. An Interim Agreement is a preliminary, limited-scope pact that addresses select...
Trade remedies are measures permitted under WTO rules to protect domestic industries from unfair trade practices or sudden surges in imports. The three main...
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), adopted in 1982 and entering into force in 1994, establishes the international legal framework...
The United States employs a layered sanctions regime through the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), a division of the US Treasury Department....
The Asian Development Bank (ADB), established in 1966 and headquartered in Manila, Philippines, is a regional multilateral development finance institution....
BIMSTEC is a regional multilateral organization established in 1997 comprising seven member states: Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka...
A Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA) is a broad trade pact negotiated between two countries covering goods, services, investments, and regulatory frameworks....
The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) is the single-point military adviser to the Defence Minister and the Cabinet Committee on Security, and the permanent...
Critical minerals (lithium, cobalt, nickel, rare earth elements, and others) are essential inputs for clean energy technologies (batteries, EV motors, wind...
The DAC is the apex decision-making body for all capital acquisition proposals for the Indian Armed Forces. It was constituted in 2001 as part of the...
Summoning a foreign diplomat to the Ministry of External Affairs is a formal act of diplomatic protest under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations...
DGFT functions under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and is responsible for implementing India's Foreign Trade Policy (FTP). It regulates export and...
India is the world's third-largest energy consumer and imports approximately 85% of its crude oil requirements. LPG demand has grown sharply since the PMUY...
India's FDI policy, governed by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), permits foreign investment through two routes. The...
Food security, as defined by the 1996 World Food Summit, exists when 'all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe, and...
Foreign Direct Investment refers to cross-border investment where an investor in one country acquires a lasting interest in — and significant degree of...
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), adopted in 1982 and entered into force in 1994, is the primary international legal framework...
Free trade agreements such as the India-New Zealand FTA operate as a recognised exception to the WTO's Most-Favoured-Nation (MFN) principle, under which a...
Investment banks like Goldman Sachs produce GDP growth forecasts using macroeconomic models that incorporate leading indicators (PMI, credit growth...
The term 'Global South' broadly refers to developing and emerging economies, predominantly located in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. India and Brazil are...
Imported inflation refers to price increases that originate externally — from rising global commodity prices (particularly oil), currency depreciation...
India has historically pursued a doctrine of strategic autonomy — maintaining independent foreign policy positions rather than aligning with any single...
India has developed a multi-layered AI governance approach. Beginning with NITI Aayog's National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence (June 2018) with its...
India is the world's largest cotton producer, growing approximately 6 million tonnes annually, and the second-largest exporter after the US. Cotton...