| Publication |
2014.
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| Summary/Abstract |
In the Sino-Indian dynamic, there are several theatres of play - thematic and geographic. One such crucible in this competition is the Central Asian space. There is much Indian diplomacy could learn from the Chinese pursuit of Central Asia. There is, however, also many allowances that those scrutinising India's position in Central Asia need to make before announcing their final verdict on the subject. The compulsions of a formalised structure of education, often trumps the catholicity in the pursuit of knowledge. So attuned does the understanding of an area become to the straightjacketed contours of
the academic training imbibed, that it threatens a rightful appreciation of the myriad variables which define a subject. The study of India's relations with Central Asia has variously been the interest of academics who study it through the prism of a singular domain of expertise - economic, political, social, anthropological, and historical, among others. Such focused attention undoubtedly ensures a level of expertise that a multidisciplinary approach cannot guarantee; and yet, it is perhaps equally true that it is well-nigh impossible to gauge the value of India's engagement with the Central Asian States on the basis of a single discipline. An almost natural tendency to do this portrays India's Central Asian story as abysmal when compared with China's. Such a narrative overlooks the possibility that China and India's stakes in the Central Asian region are far from being equal, much less the same.
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