Grand Tamasha

Can India Keep Its Balance in West Asia?

Episode Summary

For more than a decade, India has steadily deepened its ties with the Gulf while trying to balance competing interests across the region. How is India being impacted by the Iran crisis? And what do these geopolitical shifts mean for India’s West Asia policy? To discuss these and other questions, Milan is joined on the show this week by Kabir Taneja, the Executive Director of the Observer Research Foundation’s Middle East office.

Episode Notes

For more than a decade, India has steadily deepened its ties with the Gulf while trying to balance competing interests across the region. But today, that strategy is under strain—thanks to the Iran conflict, shifting regional alignments, a reemerging Pakistan. 

How is India being impacted by the Iran crisis? And what do these geopolitical shifts mean for India’s West Asia policy? 

To discuss these and other questions, Milan is joined on the show this week by Kabir Taneja. Kabir is the Executive Director of the Observer Research Foundation’s Middle East office. He has worked extensively on India’s relations with the Middle East, examining domestic political dynamics, terrorism, non-state militant actors, and the region’s evolving security architecture. He is also the author of The ISIS Peril: The World’s Most Feared Terror Group and Its Shadow on South Asia.

Milan and Kabir discuss India’s emerging political and strategic relationships in the Gulf, the risks the country faces from the Iran conflict, and the potential for India to play a larger regional security role in the Middle East. Plus, the two discuss Pakistan’s frenetic diplomatic maneuvering and the state of Afghanistan-India ties.

Episode notes:

  1. Kabir Taneja, “Pak Is Finally Back In Middle East's 'Good Books'. But Can It Stay There?” NDTV, April 30, 2026.
  2. Kabir Taneja, “How Air Power will Reshape Geopolitics in the Gulf,” ORF Middle East, April 17, 2026.
  3. Kabir Taneja, “A West Asia security rethink amid America’s role,” Hindu, April 2, 2026.
  4. Kabir Taneja, “Reading the tea leaves in the conflict in West Asia,” Hindustan Times, March 10, 2026.
  5. Kabir Taneja, “Navigating Strategic Autonomy: India and the Middle East in a Multipolar World,” February 9, 2026.
  6. Nicolas Blarel, “India Navigates a Divided Middle East,” in Milan Vaishnav, ed. India and a Changing Global Order: Foreign Policy in the Trump 2.0 Era (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2026).
  7. Kabir Taneja, “Between New Delhi & Kabul, a fine balance,” Hindustan Times, October 13, 2025.