Abstract
In the 21st century, India is more and more often perceived as a state
with a growing political, economic and military potential, which together
with China may dominate the international arena in the future. India
started to accentuate its position in international relations 60 years ago so
such a scenario would be its crowning achievement in its aspiration to be
a superpower. The first Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s policy
of non-alignment, promotion of peace and world development in the 1950s
aimed to establish India’s leadership. Although the priorities of India’s
foreign policy were reformulated because of the changing regional and global
conditions during the cold war (including the American-Pakistani-Chinese
alliance), the state has never abandoned its aspirations to be a superpower. It
should be remembered that contemporary strategy of India’s development is
not only a result of reforms initiated in the 90s but also a legacy of the policy
developed during the cold war, oscillating between idealism and realism.