Strategic myopia: Why India stumbles as China plans

Time of India

19-05-2025

V. Raghunathan is a former Director of the Schulich School of Business (India Program), York University, Toronto, a former professor at IIM Ahmedabad and a former President of ING Vysya Bank. A prolific author, he has written over 15 books, including the national bestseller Games Indians Play (Penguin). With more than 600 published papers and articles, his latest books include The Lion, The Admiral, and A Cat Called B. Uma Vijaylakshmi (Westland, 2025) and To Every Parent; To Every Child (Penguin, 2025) and Irrationally Rational: 10 Nobel Laureates Script the Story of Behavioural Economics (Penguin 2022), among others. LESS ... MORE
It is worth reflecting on whether India, as a nation, operates with an integrated strategic mindset. Not in the superficial sense often invoked in political speeches or media panels but in the substantive understanding of long-term planning, policy consistency, and institutional coordination. As a large nation, do we think strategically in the long term, beyond the next elections or bureaucratic inertia? When contrasted with China, the answers appear sobering.
For nearly half a century now, China has, over the last four decades, demonstrated a national agenda consistent with its priorities and ambitions. It pursues long-term strategic thinking and planning, integrates policies across domains, and maintains coherence in foreign and domestic goals. India, by contrast, has struggled to maintain focus and follow-through. We often announce projects with fanfare but fumble when it comes to implementation. Policies emerge without adequate inter-ministerial alignment. Our fragmented administration and political volatility frequently undermine our strategic intent.
Let us take the infrastructure strategy––a keystone of national development and security. China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has reshaped global geopolitics and reconfigured economic ties across national geographies. Their focussed investments in infrastructure—namely in roads, ports, railways, and energy corridors—have extended their influence through three continents: Asia, Africa, and Europe. India, meanwhile, has struggled to complete its own regional projects. The modest Indian initiative on India, the other hand, namely the Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral Highway, remains incomplete years after initiation, hobbled by funding scarcities, missing contractors, and lack of inter-governmental alignment.
Another example is China's increasing influence in South Asia. It has become a key strategic player in our North, South, East, and West through sustained investment and engagement, namely in Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and the Maldives. India's relationships with these same neighbours have often been reactive rather than proactive and marked by inconsistencies. While valuable, cultural diplomacy and historical ties have proven inadequate when weighed against China's economic leverage and infrastructure diplomacy.
On the defence strategy front, the contrast continues. All across the Indo-China Himalayan border, China has built dual-use infrastructure, strengthening its logistical capabilities. China has established naval bases and logistical hubs from Djibouti to Gwadar, consolidating its strategic presence across the Indian Ocean. In contrast, while India has taken notable strides in recent years, we are, at best, a poor second to China when it comes to infrastructure and coordinated operational capability. Our roads, air strips, and logistics are all still vulnerable to bureaucratic bottlenecks and climatic disruptions.
Digital infrastructure and technology present a similar dichotomy. China has invested heavily in artificial intelligence, quantum computing, surveillance technology, and space exploration. It sees these as foundational to future economic and military power. India has world-class talent and entrepreneurial energy but lacks coordinated investment and policy clarity. While initiatives like Digital India have helped expand access, no overarching national strategy is comparable to China's Made in China 2025 or its AI development plans.
Even in space, which one of India's long-held strengths, the difference in scale and ambition is evident. China has successfully established its space station, undertaken crewed missions and embarked on deep space exploration projects. India's space agency, ISRO, while well-known for its frugality and cost-effective achievements, remains financially starved and overworked. Regulatory hurdles and insufficient political backing remain obstacles in their key decision-making areas.
Nor is India's domestic policy landscape free of persistent inconsistencies. Recent developments relating to electric vehicles (EVs) make a good example of what not to do. : For instance, while we offered subsidies to the sector to encourage quick adoption, these efforts were frequently undermined by tax hikes or regulatory uncertainty, like restrictions and bans imposed on electric bike taxis.
One may push for exports, while another imposes restrictions to meet unrelated objectives. Coordination is sporadic and usually crisis-driven. Unlike China, where strategic planning institutions such as the National Development and Reform Commission help align various arms of government, India has no comparable mechanism for cross-sectoral planning and implementation.
Our foreign policy reveals a clear gap between ambition and execution. While the country envisions itself as lead voice in multilateral fora and sees itself as a rising global power, when it comes to turning that vision into reality, we typically fall short. While India may be persuasive on international platforms, it lacks the financial clout and strategic coherence to shape outcomes decisively. In contrast, China integrates its diplomacy with well-aligned economic and military strategies, consistently converting intent into tangible influence.
It is easy to dismiss much of China's successes in their strategic planning to their authoritarian regime while chalking up our own lesser achievements to our democracy. But that would hardly be convincing. After all, democracies like Germany, South Korea, and others have shown that democracy does not necessarily conflict with long-term strategic planning. Russia is an example of an authoritarian regime with much less success than China. Whether a nation is dictatorial or democratic, what works is the robustness of institutions, consistency in strategic thinking, and sustained political commitment. India may have the capability, but it needs to overcome its internal contradictions and inertia.
What is required is a cultural shift in governance: from ad hoc decision-making to deliberate planning, from fragmented action to coordinated strategy. We should expect our Planning Commission (Niti Ayog) to work in this direction. Ministries must communicate, policies must be stress-tested for coherence, and long-term goals must transcend electoral calculations. Civil-military synergy needs institutional backing. Someone must guide infrastructure projects to abide not only by local priorities but also by national security and economic strategy.
There must also be a rethinking of how India approaches technology and industrial policy. Instead of reacting to global trends, India must proactively identify sectors of strategic importance and invest in building capabilities over time. Space, semiconductors, clean energy, and advanced manufacturing require incentives and integrated missions involving academia, industry, and government.
If India is to be taken seriously by innovators, investors and strategic partners, we must be seen to be consistent and reliable. This is unlikely when we indulge in frequent policy changes, delayed and convoluted judicial decisions, retrospective legislation, regulatory unpredictability, and administrative opacity, and it damages our credibility. Clearly, we can't have strategic clarity without transparency and accountability.
A strategic vision goes hand in hand with transparency and accountability. Frequent policy reversals, retrospective application of laws, delayed judicial orders, regulatory unpredictability, and bureaucratic opacity hurt India's credibility as a functioning and dependable nation. We lack neither ideas, nor talent, nor ambition. What it lacks is institutional alignment and strategic continuity. It must recognize that planning is not the enemy of innovation, and discipline is not the enemy of democracy. If India is to emerge as a global power in the decades ahead, it must move beyond slogans and announcements and instead build systems and strategies that endure.
Strategy is not just about thinking big. It is about thinking ahead, thinking together, and thinking through. India must rise to this challenge—or risk being left behind by those who already have.
Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer
Views expressed above are the author's own.