Zakharov Aleksey Igorevich – Ph.D. in History, Researcher, International Laboratory on World Order Studies and the New Regionalism, National Research University «Higher School of Economics» Drozdova Anna Vladimirovna – Research assistant, Research Laboratory for Political Geography and Contemporary Geopolitics, National Research University «Higher School of Economics»
The article provides an overview of the main areas of cooperation between the European Union and India with a focus on the role of democracy and human rights issues in the bilateral agenda, analyzes different views on Indian democracy among European scholars, traces the reaction of EU officials on some controversial decisions by the Indian government, and identifies the distinctive features of the New Delhi and Brussels’ approach to democracy promotion. The authors characterize the Indian democratic system, identify the key factors of its sustainability and provide researchers’ opinions regarding its classification and future development trends. Particular attention is paid to the official discourse at the level of representatives and authorities of the European Union regarding the observance of human rights in India on the example of three cases occurred in 2019–2020: the abrogation of Article 370 of the Indian Constitution, the adoption by the Parliament of India of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), and Hindu-Muslim clashes in Delhi. Assessing the impact of democracy and human rights’ agenda on the EU–India relations, the authors argue that the existing disagreements on this track will not challenge the development of the relationship and will stay on the periphery of the bilateral dialogue. Most likely, the EU will remain restrained on sensitive issues for the Indian government, especially on the issue of Kashmir and the religious minorities’ rights, given the growing geopolitical and geo-economic threats and the rising importance of India for Brussels’ foreign policy in Asia.
European Union, India, democracy, human rights, religious minorities, Kashmir, foreign policy.
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