Southeast Asia’s shifting geopolitics: A challenge for India’s Act East policy
“Amid these regional shifts, India’s Act East Policy (AEP) — launched in 2014 as an evolution of the earlier Look East Policy — seeks to deepen its strategic and economic engagement with Southeast Asia. While notable progress has been made in strengthening diplomatic and defence ties with ASEAN countries, the policy’s economic dimension reveals stark imbalances. Although trade volumes have expanded, India’s investment footprint in the region remains heavily skewed, with over 95 per cent of its outward FDI concentrated in Singapore, raising concerns about the depth and diversification of its economic engagement. Furthermore, the connectivity pillar of India’s Act East Policy remains underdeveloped. It is impeded by political instability in Myanmar — highlighted by the 2021 military coup and ongoing ethnic conflicts that have delayed approximately 30 per cent of the India–Myanmar–Thailand Trilateral Highway — and by India’s bureaucratic bottlenecks, land-acquisition challenges, and infrastructure delays in its Northeast.”
“India is steadily sharpening its maritime diplomacy across the Indo-Pacific. It will soon assume the Chair of the Indian Ocean Naval Symposium (IONS) for 2025–2027, underscoring its growing role in regional naval dialogues. At the same time, India is deepening ties with ASEAN through forums like the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting Plus (ADMM+), where it co-chaired the first India–ASEAN Defence Ministers’ meeting in March this year. Operationally, India’s navy is building real-time partnerships: recent joint search-and-rescue drills with Malaysia, the ASEAN–India Maritime Exercise (AIME) co-hosted with Singapore, and India’s active participation in Indonesia’s International Fleet Review and Exercise Komodo 2025, all signal a commitment to shared regional security. Frequent port calls — to Kota Kinabalu, Bali, and Sabang — further demonstrate expanding interoperability with Southeast Asian partners.”