How does the recent takeover of Afghanistan by Taliban impact India’s strategic interests? (150 words) (2021, 10 Marks)
The Taliban’s return in August 2021 collapsed, almost overnight, a position India had built over two decades and more than US$3 billion of development work. Ties reaching back to the 1950 Treaty of Friendship were left without a partner in Kabul. The impact falls on four Indian interests, though the balance has shifted since.
Security: the terrorism vector
- An unfriendly Kabul can again become a sanctuary for India-focused groups. UN sanctions monitoring teams have reported Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed camps in eastern Afghanistan, which the Taliban deny.
- The Haqqani network, blamed for the 2008 bombing of India’s Kabul embassy, took senior posts in the new government. Memories of the post-1989 flow of fighters into Kashmir and the 1999 IC-814 hijacking shaped Delhi’s alarm.
- The Islamic State Khorasan Province, which attacked a Kabul gurdwara in March 2020 using a recruit from India, gained room in the vacuum left by the American exit.
Geopolitics: Pakistan and China
- The takeover looked like the triumph of Pakistan’s strategic depth doctrine.
- It opened space for China, which accepted a Taliban ambassador’s credentials (January 2024) and eyed mining and a CPEC extension; Russia went further and recognised the Emirate in July 2025. India, outside the Doha process, risked a Pakistan-friendly Kabul weakening its hand against Islamabad.
Investments and connectivity
- Indian assets, from the Salma Dam to the Parliament building, lost their supervising state, and the embassy closed.
- Chabahar and the Zaranj–Delaram road, built to bypass Pakistan, lost their Afghan purpose, along with India’s route to Central Asia and TAPI gas. American sanctions pressure, with the Chabahar waiver lapsing in April 2026, compounds the loss.
The unexpected offset
By the logic of Kautilya’s mandala, a hostile Pakistan makes Kabul a natural partner of Delhi, and events bore this out. The Taliban fell out with Islamabad over the TTP and the Durand Line; fighting from October 2025 became declared open war in February 2026 and flared again in September 2026. Kabul condemned the Pahalgam attack, sent acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi to Delhi (October 2025), and accepted an upgraded Indian embassy. India now hosts a Taliban chargé d’affaires without recognising the regime.
Conclusion
The takeover was a clear strategic setback: lost presence, a heightened terror risk and stranded connectivity. Pakistan’s strategic depth has since turned into a second front, giving India a cheap opening. The lasting lesson is that India’s Afghan stake needs its own access routes and channels to every Afghan faction, not dependence on whichever power guards Kabul.