India’s relationship with Afghanistan has long been shaped by geography, history and strategic competition. For decades New Delhi invested in schools, hospitals, infrastructure and human capital across Afghanistan, cultivating ties that were as much about development as they were about strategic depth. The dramatic return of the Taliban to power in August 2021 forced a recalibration: India evacuated personnel, closed most consulates and publicly refused to extend de jure recognition to the new rulers. Yet even as New Delhi kept its distance in diplomatic terms, it quietly preserved channels for essential contact humanitarian aid, technical missions and low-profile talks accepting a fraught reality in which India’s interests in Kabul had to be advanced through cautious, pragmatic engagement rather than moral endorsement. This duality between principled non-recognition and functional diplomacy now defines India’s posture toward the Taliban and frames the calculus of risks and opportunities that New Delhi must manage.
The most concrete sign of India’s pragmatic tilt has been a gradual restoration of higher-level contacts and moves to revive a formal presence in Kabul. In 2022 and 2023 New Delhi maintained a technical mission focused on aid and limited diplomatic activity; by 2025 those contacts had matured into reciprocal high-level meetings and announcements about reopening or upgrading the embassy in Kabul. These developments reflect more than bilateral impulse: regional geopolitics has shifted. China, Russia and Pakistan have been deepening their ties with the Taliban, and Iran’s role as a transit corridor for aid and trade through Chabahar has acquired renewed significance. Faced with the prospect of being marginalized in its own neighbourhood, India appears to have chosen engagement as the lesser strategic risk a path that preserves leverage on practical issues such as consular access, development projects and assurances against cross-border militancy, while stopping short of formal recognition.
Engagement yields immediate and tangible opportunities. First, a functioning diplomatic presence allows India to protect and assist Afghan civilians who have longstanding educational, familial and economic ties to India. New Delhi has been a leading donor to Afghan reconstruction and humanitarian relief; embassy staff are essential to coordinate aid deliveries, oversee scholarship programs and maintain the human links that constitute India’s soft power in Afghanistan. Second, direct dialogue provides India with a means to secure practical guarantees assurances that Afghan soil will not be used as a staging ground for groups that threaten Indian security. While such assurances are never ironclad, the ability to press the Taliban publicly and privately is a valuable tool in New Delhi’s risk management toolbox. Third, engagement opens modest commercial and infrastructural avenues, from transit through Chabahar to potential assistance in sectors like power, health and telecommunications projects that, if pursued carefully, could anchor Indian interests in ways that are less vulnerable to external influence.
Yet these opportunities are counterbalanced by structural and moral risks that India cannot ignore. The Taliban’s track record on human rights, particularly the rights of women and minorities, remains a profound concern for Indian policymakers who must weigh domestic opinion, regional credibility and international norms. Any visible normalization risks the perception that India is willing to look past these abuses for short-term strategic gain. That is not merely rhetorical: civil society groups, Afghan diaspora voices and international partners many of whom condition deeper engagement on demonstrable improvements in governance and human rights will scrutinize New Delhi’s choices. Beyond reputational costs, there are strategic hazards. The Taliban’s relations with Pakistan’s security establishment, and historical ties to groups that have targeted India, complicate the promise of any security assurances. Trust is thin; guarantees given in diplomatic parlance are not necessarily mirrored by control on the ground, where diverse militant actors, cross-border sanctuaries and local power brokers operate with their own incentives.
Operationally, India faces the difficult task of translating diplomatic presence into actionable safeguards. That requires calibrated diplomacy that blends carrots and sticks: humanitarian assistance and development cooperation that signal long-term commitment, coupled with clear, internationally anchored conditions for instance, verifiable mechanisms to prevent the transhipment of arms, to deny safe haven to proscribed groups, and to allow consular access and monitoring by neutral observers where feasible. New Delhi’s negotiating leverage is limited; the Taliban need international legitimacy, technical assistance and access to banking and trade channels. India can use these needs to extract commitments, but enforcement will be the challenge. Here, multilateral leverage matters: aligning New Delhi’s approach with the United Nations, regional stakeholders, and like-minded powers can amplify pressure and reduce the temptation of the Taliban to renege on promises without cost.
The security calculus is further complicated by intelligence and counter-terrorism dynamics. India’s primary concern has always been to prevent Afghanistan from turning into a launchpad for anti-India militancy. In the 1990s the sheltering of Pakistan-based terrorist groups within Taliban-controlled zones left an indelible scar on New Delhi’s strategic memory. Contemporary Taliban rhetoric about denying space to such actors is necessary but not sufficient. India’s engagement therefore needs to be accompanied by robust intelligence cooperation, monitoring of militant networks, and contingency planning for asymmetric threats cyber, hybrid and kinetic that exploit porous borders and fragmented governance. Such measures may require quieter forms of cooperation with regional and extra-regional partners, as well as investment in defensive infrastructure along border regions and in strategic communications to counter disinformation or radicalizing narratives.
Another layer of complexity comes from India’s broader strategic competition in the region. Pakistan’s historical influence over certain Taliban factions and China’s deepening economic footprint in Afghanistan are two variables that shape New Delhi’s options. Engagement with the Taliban may secure short-term gains but could also trigger political signals New Delhi must manage carefully: rapprochement should not be perceived as acquiescence to increased Chinese or Pakistani influence in Kabul. Conversely, isolation would have left India peripheral to Afghan reconstruction dynamics and forfeited influence over regional supply lines and counter-terrorism architecture. Thus, India’s policy is inherently a balancing act seeking to safeguard national security and development interests while preventing geopolitical encirclement. Strategic patience, hedging and diversified regional diplomacy are therefore essential complements to any bilateral outreach.
The moral dimension remains unavoidable. India has historically positioned itself as a voice for pluralism and for the rights of religious and ethnic minorities in the region. Any sustained diplomatic engagement will require New Delhi to negotiate with its conscience as well as with realpolitik. One way to reconcile these tensions is to link engagement to conditionality: tie deeper cooperation to measurable improvements in human rights, especially women’s education and public participation; insist on transparent governance measures; and use India’s aid and technical resources to empower civil society and local institutions wherever possible. Such conditional engagement clear-eyed, principled and publicly communicated helps India retain moral authority even as it pursues pragmatic interests. It also strengthens the case that engagement, when combined with pressure from a chorus of international actors, can be a lever for incremental change rather than a blank cheque.
Finally, India’s approach must be adaptive and long-term. Afghanistan’s politics will continue to be fluid, and policy that is overly transactional risks either premature withdrawal or complicity in negative outcomes. New Delhi should invest in a multi-track strategy that combines diplomacy with development, human security initiatives, cultural and educational connections, and sustained intelligence cooperation. It should also work to institutionalize mechanisms through regional frameworks, multilateral sanctions lists and joint monitoring arrangements that make commitments verifiable and that distribute the burden of enforcement across multiple actors. In short, India’s engagement should be strategic rather than episodic, anchored in a realistic appraisal of what diplomacy can achieve and what remains beyond reach.
India’s diplomatic engagement with the Taliban is therefore neither a simple act of recognition nor a straightforward exercise in moral compromise. It is a high-stakes experiment in pragmatic statecraft: an attempt to secure national interests, protect vulnerable populations, and retain leverage in a region undergoing rapid geopolitical realignment. The opportunities are clear humanitarian outreach, protection of long-standing cultural and educational ties, and modest economic and strategic gains but so are the risks: reputational damage, potential security spillovers and the ethical cost of engaging an administration with troubling human rights practices. How New Delhi manages this tightrope will be a test of its diplomatic acumen and of the broader international community’s ability to shape Afghanistan’s future in ways that prioritize human dignity, regional stability and the rule of law. The stakes are high, and the outcomes will echo far beyond Kabul’s dusty streets.
India’s Engagement with the Taliban: Balancing Risks and Strategic Necessity
