Discuss the humanitarian role played by India in the crisis – stricken Gulf countries like Yemen and Iraq. (2015, 15 Marks)
India’s humanitarian role in West Asia follows the consent-based principles of UN General Assembly resolution 46/182 (1991): humanity, neutrality and impartiality, with aid delivered through host governments and the UN rather than by intervention. Presented through the ideal of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR) has become an instrument of soft power in Joseph S. Nye’s sense: influence through attraction, not coercion.
Yemen: rescue without alignment
- Operation Raahat (1–11 April 2015). After the Saudi-led air campaign began, India evacuated about 4,640 of its citizens and 960 nationals of 41 other countries. Some 2,900 left Sanaa on 18 flights and about 1,670 left by sea on INS Sumitra, Mumbai and Tarkash, staging through Djibouti, where Gen. Vijay Kumar Singh, Minister of State for External Affairs, directed the effort. Americans, Europeans and Pakistanis were among those carried out.
- Access through neutrality. The coalition opened pauses in its bombing and the Houthis allowed movement to the ports, because India had sided with neither.
- Sustained relief. India sent 360,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses through COVAX (March 2021), about 25 tonnes of medicines to Aden aboard a Coast Guard ship (February 2025) and some 67 tonnes aboard INS Chennai (November 2025). ICCR scholarships for Yemeni students continue, and Indian wheat has helped Yemen’s food supply since 2022.
- At sea. When Houthi missiles struck merchant shipping, INS Visakhapatnam fought the fire on the tanker Marlin Luanda (January 2024).
Iraq: relief through three wars
- 1990 airlift. About 170,000 Indians stranded by the invasion of Kuwait were moved through Iraq to Amman and flown home on 488 flights, then a record civilian air evacuation.
- Sanctions era. Indian firms supplied food and medicines under the UN Oil-for-Food programme.
- 2003. Parliament’s resolution of 8 April 2003 deplored the invasion and recorded aid of ₹100 crore and 50,000 tonnes of wheat; India committed US$20 million to the UN flash appeal and US$10 million more at the Madrid donors’ conference (October 2003), while refusing troops without a UN mandate.
- The ISIS crisis (2014). Forty-six Indian nurses trapped in Tikrit were freed on 4 July 2014 through quiet negotiation. The counter-case is the thirty-nine workers abducted in Mosul, whose deaths were confirmed only on 20 March 2018.
Assessment
- Strengths. Naval and airlift capacity, a wide consular network and access to all parties have made India a credible first responder.
- Limits. The role is reactive: it moves people but does not shape outcomes. India had no part in ending the Yemen war, and in 2026 Pakistan, not India, mediated the Iran ceasefire. Indian aid volumes are small beside Gulf and Western donors.
- Interests. Humanitarianism also protects a diaspora of 9–10 million in the region and India’s energy ties, as a realist reading would expect.
Conclusion
In Yemen and Iraq India has been a neutral rescuer and a modest donor; its restraint is what secures access. Turning that goodwill into influence would need sustained reconstruction aid and a diplomatic voice that a rescue mission alone cannot supply.