The Parliament of India plays a critical role in drafting and influencing the country’s foreign policy. That is what makes KV Prasad’s new book, Indian Parliament: Shaping Foreign Policy, an important read. Divided into 12 chapters, the author covers wideranging topics around policy-making, which include India’s relation with Sri Lanka, nuclear energy debates since independence, policy dictates of single-party governments, and the compulsion of coalition arrangements among others.
As the focus on three major policy debates finds mention in the book, Prasad writes, “Foreign policy and the Parliament is a wide canvas. While the book makes broad brushstrokes on the deliberations across 75 years, the focus is to evaluate the approach on three specific dimensions—security, geoeconomic, and geopolitical/ strategic—from the prism of key decisions that have a lasting imprint on India’s foreign policy.”
The author also mentions how Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and the Congress discussed foreign policy issues in the Constituent Assembly and then the Provisional Parliament. One of the key issues was India joining the Commonwealth. He writes, “The question of a free India, which had gained freedom from the British, entertaining the idea of becoming a part of the Commonwealth agitated members. The formulations and deliberations of the government, those in the Assembly and the Congress party, which adopted a resolution, eventually led to Prime Minister Nehru signing the agreement.”
There is emphasis on the United Nations and the other world bodies. One of the major concerns around this was having fewer representatives of India working in the world body, which has been discussed in detail in the book. Moving on, Prasad focuses on how the Tamil-speaking people of Sri Lanka were ‘a legacy issue for independent India.’ The issue has been explained in great detail by the author, especially for those trying to understand it from an academic point of view.
Then comes the nuclear debate, which forms one of the key chapters of the book. Prasad writes, “Replying to the debate during the passage of the Atomic Energy Bill, PM Nehru iterated that India must develop nuclear energy and use it for peaceful purposes and the development of human life and happiness and not for war and hatred.”
Overall, the book is important, especially for research students and towards understanding what shaped the foreign policy of India and how over the years the Parliament has asserted its role in the debates around policy making.