'Realigning India's Vietnam policy through cooperative sustainable development: A geostrategic counterbalancing to China in Indo-Pacific'.

Abstract

Vietnam is a key player in India’s Act East Policy and is distressed due to China’s overarching position in the South China Sea. China’s expanding infrastructural investments in India’s periphery have led to a regional security dilemma in Indian Ocean Region. India is steered to pursue opportunities to counter China in the latter’s periphery, to which Vietnam fts as an apt ally. Hence, this paper examines the heightened need for realigning India’s Vietnam policy in line with United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and explains how bilateral cooperation through sustainable trade, renewable energy production, and green investments can ofer a “counter” to Chinese expansion in Indo-Pacifc and its Belt and Road Initiative. This paper uses the theoretical framework of Balance of Power to enumerate how geostrategic policy decisions in India-Vietnam bilateral relations can create a “counterbalance” to the Chinese investments in India’s neighborhood, especially in Pakistan.