To get a sense of how Indian foreign policy evolved over the year, examine New Delhi’s approach to G20, the biggest multilateral process and event of 2023; its relationships with the great powers (US, Russia and China); its treatment of the immediate and extended neighbourhood (South, Southeast and West Asia); and its role in the global south, the wide descriptor for the poor and developing countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America.

The examination throws up a report card where India scores high marks on most fronts. But it also gives a sense of areas of weakness where, unless Indian diplomacy does its homework more rigorously and collaborates with the right actors at the right time, unanticipated questions can interrupt its progress to the next stage.

A year of accomplishmentsLeading a bloc of the world’s 20 most powerful economies by turn, in itself, is not an accomplishment. But transforming the nature of the grouping by democratising its agenda and participation, ensuring a common declaration when members of the group are, literally and figuratively, at war with each other, and positioning itself as the voice of the global south, is.

That is what India did in 2023 with its G20 presidency, scoring a win in its quest to push an agenda of reformed multilateralism. Holding G20 meetings outside the Capital may have been a part of the domestic political recalibration where foreign policy achievements are used as a tool of electoral mobilisation, but it did create a sense of ownership and interest in a process that was largely handled by technocrats. It also exposed the world’s political and bureaucratic elite to an India outside Delhi. Convening two voice of the global south summits and getting the African Union into the group gave India greater legitimacy to speak for the developing world and present an alternative to China’s predatory models of outreach.

On the substance, finding a language that was acceptable to all sides on Ukraine, with a focus on the adverse implications of the war, reflected diplomatic dexterity. Pushing the agenda of digital public infrastructure and financial inclusion in the G20 was a way to showcase India’s finest innovation of the century on the global stage. Offering a road map to reform multilateral development banks and link it with enhancing climate finance, while keeping the developmental mandate of the banks intact, was a major contribution. And these were just some of the achievements that will now be carried over by the Brazilian presidency.

Deepening ties with what remains the world’s most formidable power is, in itself, not an accomplishment, especially when the relationship has been on an upward trajectory for over two decades. But transforming the quality of the relationship to work together on global issues, leveraging the power of the US to enhance Indian capabilities in the domains of the future, and managing divergences as diplomacy plays out in the public, is.

That is what India did in 2023 with the unveiling of the initiative on critical and emerging technologies (iCET) in January. This opened the doors for discussions on a defence industrial road map, co-production and tech transfer on jet engines, semiconductor investments by American majors, collaborating from the very start on setting the rules of the road for artificial intelligence and leveraging the new tech, and preparing both systems to tweak their rules to deepen ties. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s state visit to Washington DC, and President Joe Biden’s visit to Delhi, and the innumerable cabinet-level exchanges between the two countries reflected trust and deeper engagement.

India did so while maintaining ties with Russia, even deepening it where it helps national interests. Russia may be weaker than it was in February 2022, but it seems stronger than it was in January 2023 given the ground situation in Ukraine and the uncertainty around support to Kyiv in western capitals. This makes Delhi’s decision not to cast its lot with the anti-Russia western coalition a smart calculation.

At the same time, India continued to deepen its connectivity and political relationships with Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka while dealing with difficult regimes in Maldives and Myanmar. It deepened ties with Saudi Arabia and UAE across a range of domains, including sensitive security and intelligence matters while also collaborating with Israel. Look out for new energy on the India-Brazil-South Africa axis as the three serve as the troika for G20. Tokyo remains Delhi’s closest friend in Asia and Paris is by far its closest friend in Europe. India also invested in ties with Latin American countries. It stepped up its development assistance and economic engagement in Africa. And it reoriented its own posture to focus on natural resources, tech, climate, supply chains, investment possibilities and trade — all areas which will be essential to sustaining India’s rise.

A year of challenges But Indian diplomacy also had a challenging time.

For one, holding the line against China, when Beijing has violated every past border agreement and entered territory India considers its own, has been difficult and expensive. But embarking on a diplomatic strategy that banks on creating wider deterrence in the region and enhances costs for China, focusing on internal capacity building to reduce dependence on China on critical goods in the medium term, and ensuring that normal diplomatic ties rest on a return to peace and tranquillity at the border on mutually acceptable terms is, in a situation of great power asymmetry, a modest achievement. India did all of this in 2023.

But this doesn’t mean that the Chinese challenge is any less salient. At the macro level, Beijing will remain the biggest obstacle to India achieving its global aims and interests. At the border, China will constantly seek to make territorial gains, boost its military infrastructure and presence, and bleed India. In the vicinity, China will continue to reinforce Pakistan’s capabilities and expand its political role in the smaller states of South Asia to contain Delhi. Across western capitals, China will engage in operations to undermine India’s ties with Europe and the US. And on the economy, China will hope to continue locking India into patterns of dependence to limit its geopolitical leverage.

The second challenge India encountered in 2023 came first from Canada’s allegations that Indian government agents were involved in the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, and then a US department of justice indictment implicating an Indian official in an assassination plot against Gurpatwant Singh Pannun. Delhi chose to respond to Ottawa with belligerence, painting Canada as a hub of extremism and violence targeted at India, and Washington DC with patience, promising to examine the allegations through a formally constituted investigation committee.

But this challenge will persist over the new year. India’s image as a responsible power is at stake. Countering narratives about how its internal political trajectory is getting reflected in its external behaviour will be important. The issue of India’s political judgment and control over intelligence agencies is being discussed in the West. How Delhi deals with an increasingly divided diaspora, where this diaspora is both a factor in Indian politics and national security as well as a factor in the politics of the country which they have made home, will pose dilemmas. And how India insulates its larger strategic relationships with the West while dealing with the specific charges at hand remains work in progress.

The third challenge, of course, remains in the realm of unanticipated events. Note how maritime trade routes into India from the Gulf have suddenly emerged as a serious security concern. The evolution of Israel’s brutal war against Gaza (for it is no longer a war just against Hamas) will reshape West Asian geopolitics. Political changes in the neighbourhood will alter security calculus abruptly. The threat of cross border terror may have diminished but is always alive till Pakistan‘s polity is the way it is. Developments in Myanmar pose a challenge across the northeast. Domestic electoral divisions can have external ripple effects. And China’s aggression in East Asia will have to be constantly watched.

But India’s demography, growth rates, hard power capabilities, soft power reach, political status as a relatively stable democracy, its edge in tech talent, the size of its market, geography and the political leadership’s careful use of these strengths to add to its strategic muscle means that Delhi’s rise as a global player in 2023 will sustain in the future.