Concept Note

India has achieved successes in plethora of substantive aspects. In this process India is growingly receiving recognition from different quarters as a power which has potential to transform not just South Asia but also as a significant player in the intentional emerging order which is undergoing gargantuan transformation opening up new possibilities and alignments. The substantive changes in international power structure are creating discomfiture among countries across the world. Developed nations are purposively attempting not to accept and accommodate aspirations of newly emerging nations and new concerns which the present world has unfolded. In this world of seemingly colluding interest India's emergence on the international landscape with equanimity is receiving renewed academic attentions. It has begun to create disconcertion among India's immediate neighbors and developed nations equally because India has begun to exhibit positive and belligerent trends in overhauling parameters that will ride India to a new stature that other had hardly imagined in the recent past. The emergence of new belligerent leadership with unusual of political powers have started to redraw world economic, political and strategic scenarios which deserve a serious academic and productive exchanges. India is the largest democracy in the world with a sustained economic growth in the last two and half decades has produced new leverages in the international arena.

India is surging in various aspects of its national life and has gained a rightful place with its democracy and economic growth as one of the major sources of soft power. However, India has not received as much recognition as it deserves as a nation with huge transformative potentialities. The role it has played in the international arena are far limited then its potentialities. The international organizations are still functioning in a manner as if they are in the Second World War situation. The world has undergone manifold changes and, therefore, the international organizations such as United Nations and other institutions to represent the present world order must accommodate the aspiration of new nations which have emerged as some sort of power centers.
In Asia, India is the finest examples of a country changing within the framework of democracy and in an orderly manner. Democracy in India has indeed put down firmer roots and economic growth has accelerated despite low quality of governance, widening political and economic inequalities, and the continuing unacceptably high number of poor, unhealthy, and illiterate people. These undeniably reenergize the demand for a more social democratic model of development. In this context one would like to engage empirically to examine why democracy took firmer roots and poor governance continue to co-exist uninterruptedly in the country. This approach to tackle these problems has produced enormous literature on the subject. Despite substantial increase in the role of private player in the economy the state play vigorous role in promoting economic growth and welfare provisions. The growing power of capital in the social and economic life has grown over the years.

Introduction of economic reforms in the 1990s have given rise to no dramatic changes in the structure of government or the machinery of administration. Nevertheless, it has resulted into some subtle changes partly from the phenomenal increase in aspiration pitted against the limited capacity of a retreating state, but also as the steady attrition in the standing and credibility of coalition governments till the rise of present incumbent. The world witnessed a severe economic downturn since 2008 which ravaged the economic health of most countries but India has successfully come out and it could achieve an economic growth which was higher than most nations in the world. Further, the resurgent India now does not feel shy of taking bold decisions like surgical strikes and demonetization of 2016. It is in this context, the global audience would be interested to abreast of the possible role of India in an economically ravaged world and the call for more glocalization.

In a similar fashion, India's international engagements with neighbors, major partners, institutions, collaborations, blocks and regional groupings are also undergoing manifold changes. These structural transitional dynamics are transpiring in India's foreign engagements and in the realm of geopolitics of international trade. Is India's increasing economic might placing its leverage on contemporary international politics? The transitional dynamics in global power centers and emergence of new powers in Asia and elsewhere has brought in challenges and opportunities for India's upsurge in international posturing. The deepening of strategic maneuvering based on strong leadership has further shaped domestic and international orientation of engagements for rich dividends.

The new non-conventional power, new economic powers, emerging political, economic and strategic engagements are unfolding both opportunities and challenges to countries around the world. How India has been responding to such substantive changes and how will it deal with the future challenges? Can India achieve sustained economic growth through democratic means in the long run and eliminate chronic problems of poverty, illiteracy, health services, infrastructure development and unemployment in immediate future? Can India's phenomenal rise in economic growth match similar achievements in social sector developments deserve equal attentions?