· Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent engagement with Ukraine has renewed a consequential question: can India move beyond advocating dialogue and diplomacy to help shape peace?
· India’s tradition of non-alignment enabled it to engage rival blocs and maintain constructive relations with opposing sides while preserving independent judgement.
· India could help negotiate a limited agreement without becoming its military guarantor, provided it establishes credible procedures to monitor compliance and address violations.
India has traditionally been hesitant about formal mediation, mindful of its strategic autonomy and the risks of open-ended political or military commitments. Yet its diplomatic independence and unique peacekeeping experience provide credible foundations for contributing to peace in Ukraine.
Humanitarian issues offer practical avenues for engagement. However, India’s limited capacity to enforce a comprehensive settlement requires caution over security guarantees and enforcement commitments.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent engagement with Ukraine has renewed a consequential question: can India move beyond advocating dialogue and diplomacy to help shape peace? In his November 9 conversation with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Modi reaffirmed India’s human-centric approach and readiness to support a peaceful resolution. Zelenskyy subsequently said India was willing to mediate efforts to establish food corridors. New Delhi has confirmed discussions with both sides on Black Sea shipping, grain and energy exports, and possible arrangements to halt attacks. These efforts suggest a more substantive diplomatic role. Assessing its prospects requires examining India’s strengths, its limitations and the conditions for successful mediation.
India’s Record Of Peacekeeping
India’s tradition of non-alignment enabled it to engage rival blocs and maintain constructive relations with opposing sides while preserving independent judgement. This independence is often misunderstood as indifference and insensitivity to issues concerning rival groups. However, India has played an active role in conveying difficult messages and upholding international law, sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs. It has articulated competing concerns and explored accommodation across political divides through bilateral diplomatic discourse, at the United Nations (UN) and in other international bodies. This diplomatic experience, combined with its democratic credentials and pluralistic values, provides a distinctive foundation for India’s credibility in international affairs.
This approach has been accompanied by outstanding contributions to UN peacekeeping. Since 1950, more than a quarter of a million Indian personnel have served in over 50 UN missions across Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America. India also deployed the UN’s first all-female Formed Police Unit to Liberia in 2007. Indian peacekeepers have monitored ceasefires, protected civilians and supported post-conflict recovery, earning widespread respect for their professionalism and commitment.
India has nevertheless undertaken initiatives to bridge conflicting positions in special circumstances. During the Korean War, it proposed a compromise on prisoner repatriation and subsequently chaired the commission responsible for overseeing it after the 1953 armistice. It also exercised good offices during Austria’s State Treaty negotiations and advanced compromise proposals during the Suez crisis.
Helping parties reach an agreement and enabling them implement it require different skills. India’s experience in UN missions, alongside its separate role in Sri Lanka, offers valuable lessons on the need for clear commitments, acceptance by the parties concerned and realistic security arrangements to sustain peace.
In the early stages of the war, India’s continued engagement with Moscow drew sharp criticism in Western capitals. Recent European outreach to Russia lends weight to the diplomatic logic underlying India’s foreign policy: engagement remains necessary even amid profound disagreement. On October 27, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre and Finnish President Alexander Stubb spoke with President Vladimir Putin, in consultation with Ukraine, to convey their positions and support efforts to end the war. This renewed recognition of the need for dialogue could create a more favourable climate for India to contribute to peace efforts.
What Makes A Credible Mediator?
Successful mediation requires the parties’ acceptance, trust in the process and a realistic understanding of what each side will negotiate. Trusted relationships, diplomatic persuasion and economic incentives can encourage compliance. Where enforcement is required, mediators must possess the power and resolve to uphold commitments.
Over time, the peace agenda has broadened. While territory remains central, economic interdependence has widened the war’s consequences, disrupting essential supplies and deepening civilian suffering. Food and fertiliser exports, humanitarian access, essential medicines, displaced people and civilian infrastructure require practical arrangements and credible interlocutors. These offer India avenues for engagement, drawing on its diplomatic relationships and peacekeeping experience.
India’s sustained engagement with Kyiv, its consistency on sovereignty and international law and its longstanding strategic cooperation with Russia bolster its credibility.
However, India must also recognise its limits. It cannot independently deliver the security guarantees, sanctions relief or reconstruction financing that a comprehensive settlement may require. Washington and European capitals remain indispensable where their commitments are involved.
These limits still allow a focused contribution. Facilitation, monitoring and enforcement carry different responsibilities. India could help negotiate a limited agreement without becoming its military guarantor, provided it establishes credible procedures to monitor compliance and address violations.
The UN–Türkiye-brokered Black Sea Grain Initiative of 2022, supported by India, enabled Ukraine to export nearly 33 million tonnes of food commodities, showing that limited agreements can deliver substantial humanitarian benefits even amid continuing hostilities.
India’s food-corridor discussions offer a comparable opening to ease suffering and build cooperation while larger disputes remain unresolved.
Implementation requires sensitivity to Ukraine’s linguistic, cultural, religious and regional diversity. Language alone does not determine political allegiance. Returning displaced people, restoring services and rebuilding trust demand respect for cultural rights and linguistic rights. India’s experience of democratic pluralism offers useful insights, but arrangements must reflect Ukrainian circumstances and priorities. At the same time, India should uphold its longstanding position that the parties themselves must negotiate and accept any settlement on core issues, particularly territorial questions.
In an increasingly unstable world, strained international institutions and a lack of trusted intermediaries make India’s ability to engage opposing sides more valuable.
India must rise to the occasion. Securing essential supplies, protecting civilian life and building trust would further strengthen its credibility for a wider diplomatic role. However, its ambitions must remain commensurate with its capabilities.
(The author is a former Indian diplomat, economist and strategic affairs specialist)
(Views expressed are personal)
