By Nilova Roy Chaudhury
As the second month of hostilities commence in West Asia, the world is watching how those who unleashed the aggression seem caught in an impasse from which no easy way out appears and which their egos, more than their strategic imperatives, refuse to let go. US President Donald Trump’s telecast statement to the American people, his first since he launched the war against Iran on February 28, did not give any indication of what lies ahead.
Concerns are mounting across India and the world as prolonged hostilities are hammering the global economy, barely getting over the Covid crisis, with no happy ending in sight. Trump’s address further raised energy prices and hit stock markets, while fuel shortages are peaking. The war is hitting the common man everywhere, from Colombo, Chennai, Comilla, to Mawsynram, Manila and even Minnesota.
Precious lives are being lost, mostly of innocents caught in the deadly cross-fire in countries which are not even parties to the war. While the number of casualties has not been quantified, the Ministry of External Affairs confirmed that “some Indian nationals have lost their lives or are missing.”
Scarcity of cooking fuel is pushing people, particularly across South Asia, toward hunger. Livelihoods are being lost among the unorganised labour force while thousands of self-employed street vendors, smaller restaurants and eateries are being forced to close shop, facing a scary, insecure future. For middle class households across India, everyday snacks like ‘samosas’ or ‘dosas’ have become scarce, causing an unintended push toward a healthy population!
For those worst hit, it is difficult to comprehend that they must contend with hunger and deprivation because some old men in distant lands decided they did not like the nature of a particular country’s leadership.
It is apparent that President Trump did not expect the war against Iran, launched along with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to last this long. His idea was to blitzkrieg Iran’s defence and nuclear facilities and, having removed the top leadership there the first night, expect the Iranian people to rise in support of the US saviour. That has not happened.
While ordinary Iranians face death and devastation, the remains of the country’s leadership retaliated against the aggressor in an unprecedented and targeted manner to optimise their advantages. The collateral damage has set the global economy on fire, sent fuel prices sky-rocketing and wreaked severe damage across West Asia and beyond. Additionally, the uncertainty of when, or indeed if, hostilities will cease is straining international relations.
For India, at every level, the situation has been fraught. From the foreign policy perspective, images of Prime Minister Narendra Modi hugging his Israeli counterpart in Israel the morning before the attacks happened against Iran indicated that New Delhi stood with the aggressor. That India did not immediately condemn the targeted assassination of a head of state inside his sovereign country indicated a level of indecision which does not behove a country seeking a permanent place in the UN Security Council.
It is a different matter that this conflict in West Asia has shown up the United Nations for exactly what it has become; a paper tiger. India’s initial reactions to the war also appeared to dispel any semblance of bipartisanship in global conflicts. New Delhi may have begun urging for a cessation of hostilities, but the loss to its credibility as a neutral umpire is doubtless. Iran is a close neighbour with which it has civilizational ties and shared strategic interests, most recently in Chabahar port, yet India chose to remain silent against the aggression even when Tehran urged New Delhi, as chair of the BRICS group, to condemn the aggression and targeting of its leadership.
New Delhi similarly chose not to condemn the Russian aggression in Ukraine, but it did issue strong statements on the need for nations to maintain territorial integrity, and PM Modi did tell Russian President Vladimir Putin this was “not an era of war.” Now, other than generic statements seeking a cease fire, PM Modi has not publicly told his friends in Tel Aviv and Washington to end the war, although Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian has been urged to cease and desist from targeting other countries. To New Delhi’s credit, Tehran’s current leadership has chosen to stand by the people of India and allow the passage of Indian vessels through the blockaded Strait of Hormuz, thereby easing the government’s fuel procurement worries.
However, India, now a bystander in the conflict, is not out of the woods. West Asia, where the conflict is raging, is of critical importance to India. Nearly 10 million Indians live in the region, separated from the homeland only by the Arabian Sea, and send home close to USD 50 billion annually, or over 35% of India’s inward remittances. In 2025, the total remittances from the Indian diaspora totalled USD 135 billion, around 4% of India’s GDP. These contributions exceeded foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows, and amounted to over 40% of India’s trade deficit. According to the ‘Economist,’ around 38% of the amount sent by Indian citizens overseas comes from Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, six countries that make up the Gulf Cooperation Council. The region is critical for India’s trade, energy security and strategic interests.
New Delhi can do little but work the phones with leaders and officials and keep urging a cessation of hostilities, but the erosion and diminution of its global authority has been exposed in a region where it has worked very hard in recent decades to gain trust and goodwill and shore up vital strategic interests.
Other than the huge financial and strategic stress, and considerable loss of face, even more galling for India is the fact that the US has opted for Pakistan to play a mediatory role in the crisis. A flurry of diplomats has been descending on Islamabad and senior Pakistani officials are visiting key capitals, including Beijing and even Ankara, to try and find acceptable grounds for the involved parties to resume direct discussions on how to end the war and control its spiralling global impact. A successful outcome from Islamabad’s efforts, if it happens, could make the cessation of hostilities a very bitter pill for New Delhi to swallow.
