India must directly engage with Taliban 2.0

Context: The time for hesitant, backchannel interactions with the Taliban is over, and India has to begin ‘open talks’ as it is a strategic necessity.

Shifts in Indian engagements amidst US withdrawal from Afghanistan

• India’s partial “withdraw” from Afghanistan: India has decided to ramp down its civilian presence in Afghanistan and ‘temporarily’ closed its consulate in Kandahar and evacuated its diplomats and Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) personnel stationed there.
• India’s softening stance:
  • In 2018, India sent a ‘non-official delegation’ to Moscow for a conference that had Taliban, members of the Afghan High Peace Council, and other countries from the region.
  • In 2020, India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar joined the inaugural session of intra-Afghan negotiations in Doha.
  • 2021, the latest reports indicate that India has started reaching out to the Taliban.

Rationale for continuing indirect engagements with Taliban

• Potential risk of losing a trusted partner: Direct engagement with Taliban could make Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani uneasy and could potentially nudge him to look towards China and Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) for national security and personal political survival.
• Challenges in reaching out to Taliban: India has little access to members of Quetta Shura or fighters on the ground in Afghanistan. So, the only option might be Doha-based Taliban negotiators.
• Lack of clarity on Taliban’s real intentions: Given the global criticism that Taliban faced in its earlier avatar and the lack of evidence about whether the outfit is a changed lot today.
• Possibility of spill over into Kashmir: There are chances of Pakistan acting out against India in Kashmir if India were to establish deeper links with Taliban.

Compelling reasons for direct engagement with Taliban

• Taliban is going to be part of political scheme of things in Afghanistan: Unlike in 1996, a large number of players in the international community are going to recognise/negotiate/do business with Taliban.
• Pakistan factor: The less proactive the Indian engagement with Taliban, stronger Pakistan-Taliban relations would become. Letting Pakistani deep state exclusively deal with Taliban is a bad idea.
• Fissures in Afghan-Pakistan ties: A Taliban-dominated Afghanistan, next door to its Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan-infested tribal areas, may not really end up becoming a happy space for Pakistan.
• A worldly-wise and internationally-exposed Taliban 2.0 would develop its own agency and could call into question the legitimacy of Durand Line separating Pakistan and Afghanistan.
• Strategic and economic interests: India need to engage with all parties in Afghanistan, including Taliban, if it were to protect its interests after investing over $3 billion in Afghanistan.
• Geopolitical risk: If India is not proactive in Afghanistan, Russia, Iran, Pakistan, and China will emerge as shapers of Afghanistan’s political and geopolitical destiny, which for sure will be detrimental to Indian interests there.
• Supporting India’s continental grand strategy through north-western frontier: Backchannel talks with Pakistan and a consequent ceasefire on Line of Control, political dialogue with mainstream Kashmiri leadership, all indicate that India is opening up its congested north-western frontier.
• Proactive engagement of Taliban will provide this effort with more strategic heft.

Conclusion: India’s engagement with Taliban may or may not achieve much, but non-engagement will definitely hurt Indian interests. Thus, India must exorcise the demons of IC-814 (the 1999 hijacking) from its collective memory and openly engage with Taliban 2.0.