Part – I

• Adv. Rajiv Sharma

As Prime Minister Narendra Modi completed twelve years in office last month, it is an opportune moment to assess his tenure critically, not merely through the lens of unfulfilled promises, but through a more serious prism comprising his deliberate acts of commission that have weakened India’s strategic autonomy, undermined its foreign policy traditions, and compromised its long-term national interests.

Much has already been written about the infamous jumlas, his broken pledges of ‘Achhe Din’, two crore jobs annually, corruption-free governance, recovery of black money stashed abroad, a deposit of Rs. 15 lakhs in every citizen’s account, minimum government with maximum governance, and the establishment of 100 smart cities. These acts of omission are well-documented and widely acknowledged. What demands equal scrutiny, however, are the active policy decisions, the deliberate acts of commission that have eroded India’s standing as a sovereign, strategically autonomous nation.

India’s proudest foreign policy traditions, maintained across governments of different political persuasions, were non-alignment and strategic autonomy and the principled refusal to be dictated to by any great power. Under the Modi government, these traditions have been systematically hollowed out in ways that threaten to harm India’s strategic and economic interests for decades to come. Three episodes illustrate this surrender most starkly. Such acts and decisions by PM Modi stand as a telling testament to his brazen betrayal of the trust the people of India placed in him.

The Chabahar Port Debacle

The Chabahar port project on Iran’s southeastern coast was one of the most farsighted geopolitical investments in India’s post-independence history. The Manmohan Singh government formally approved India’s participation in developing the port in May 2013. Chabahar was India’s first offshore infrastructure project in the Gulf region. It was central to India’s ambitions along the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC), offering a gateway to landlocked Afghanistan, Central Asia, and Eurasian territories, entirely bypassing Pakistani territory. It was designed to counter China’s growing influence in the region, provide a strategic alternative to China’s Gwadar port, and blunt the reach of Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative.

The economic rationale was equally compelling. With India having already invested approximately $370 million in the project, Chabahar was projected to halve both the time and cost of India’s trade with Central Asian countries, potentially helping India’s exports approach $2 trillion by 2027. The port anchored a mature bilateral relationship with Iran, one supported by a double taxation avoidance agreement, an extradition treaty, and a Joint Commission on Bilateral Trade established as far back as 1983.

Under the Modi government, this carefully constructed architecture has been dismantled. Funding for Chabahar was effectively reduced to zero by 2026, and India’s bilateral trade with Iran has collapsed. India’s only independent overland corridor to Afghanistan and Central Asia now stands crippled, and the INSTC’s viability is severely compromised. It is a monumental dereliction of duty by PM Modi. His spineless surrender to US and Israeli pressure has inflicted a devastating and perhaps irreversible wound on India’s strategic autonomy and economic future, which is a blunder for which no justification exists and no apology suffices.

Most ironically, the port India built to counter Chinese influence may ultimately be handed over to Chinese operators. This means that India’s most critical strategic asset could be taken over by China. Withdrawing from strategically critical Chabahar project and handing over decisive strategic advantage to China and Pakistan in the region is not only abdication of geo-political responsibility but a betrayal of national interest. Without doubt, this act of Narendra Modi is nothing short of treason.

The Surrender on Iranian Oil

Iran was traditionally India’s second-largest oil supplier, consistently accounting for between 16 and 18 percent of total crude imports. India had also made substantial investments in Iranian refinery infrastructure over the years.

When the United States imposed sanctions on Iran in 2011-12 and pressured India to curtail oil trade, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s response was unequivocal. He addressed a press conference to publicly affirm that India would continue importing Iranian oil. When the US removed Iranian banks from the SWIFT network and the Reserve Bank of India was compelled to suspend the Asian Clearing Union mechanism for oil payments, the Manmohan Singh government innovated. It devised a rupee-rial payment mechanism through the United Commercial Bank of India, routing settlements entirely outside the dollar system. This was a direct, creative assertion of India’s strategic autonomy. To signal India’s continued commitment to the bilateral relationship, Dr Singh dispatched the Vice-President to attend the inauguration of President Rouhani. While India did reduce oil imports from Iran by approximately 11 percent for tactical reasons, it did so on its own terms, not under diktat.

The contrast with the Modi government’s conduct could not be sharper. When the first Trump administration withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018 and reimposed sanctions, India again faced a strategic choice. In 2019, the Modi government capitulated entirely, halting all crude imports from Iran without negotiation or resistance. This decision taken in 2019 cost India billions of dollars in discounted oil and devastated Indian exporters who had built long-standing market relationships in Iran over decades. Beyond the economic cost, the episode reflected a broader pattern: the abandonment of strategic independence in the face of American pressure. Modi’s craven submission to US and Israeli diktat is nothing but an unpardonable betrayal of national sovereignty that stands as the defining failure of his tenure.

The Asymmetric India-US Trade Deal Framework of February 2026

After sustained tariff pressure from the Trump administration, which imposed sweeping tariffs on India along with other trading partners, India signed a trade deal framework with the United States on February 6, 2026. The terms of this framework, as publicly described, drew widespread criticism from independent economists, farmer organisations, and opposition parties alike. Under the framework, India committed to eliminating or substantially reducing tariffs on all American goods and to opening its agricultural markets to US products including distillers’ dried grains (DDGs), sorghum, tree nuts, soybean oil, and other agricultural commodities. The United States, by contrast, retained an 18 percent tariff on Indian goods. India additionally committed to purchasing $500 billion worth of American products over five years. The asymmetry was stark: India offered duty-free access to US goods while continuing to face tariff barriers on its own exports to the American market. Independent economists broadly assessed the terms as deeply disadvantageous to India.

The deal also carried troubling contextual baggage. Critics noted that the US Department of Justice’s decision to withdraw criminal charges against industrialist Gautam Adani appeared to coincide with the finalisation of this trade agreement. This was not a mere coincidence. Many serious questions about the motivations and vulnerabilities driving India’s negotiating posture, were raised. The Leader of the Opposition in Parliament Shri Rahul Gandhi stated publicly that the Prime Minister’s ability to negotiate on equal terms had been compromised, citing, among other factors, the implications of the Adani indictment saga and other unresolved controversies involving certain members of the cabinet in infamous Epstein files. It is worth noting that subsequent legal proceedings in the United States saw the US Supreme Court strike down the broad tariff increases imposed by the Trump administration on multiple countries. This development rendered the framework’s foundational premise that India had no option but to capitulate, even more questionable in retrospect. The agreement to an unequal trade framework with the United States is just one more instance, where Narendra Modi has buckled under pressure and compromised India’s interests.

A Pattern, Not an Aberration

The aforementioned three episodes reveal a consistent and troubling pattern: a government that has repeatedly yielded to external pressure, primarily from Washington at the cost of India’s strategic interests, economic welfare, diplomatic standing and global reputation.

India’s founders, and the governments that followed them across the decades, worked painstakingly to build a foreign policy identity grounded in sovereign independence, non-alignment, and the refusal to be reduced to a client state of any great power. That identity was not merely idealism, it was strategic wisdom, allowing India to pursue its interests flexibly across a multipolar world. The erosion of that tradition under twelve years of the Modi government is not a minor foreign policy adjustment. It is a fundamental departure from the principles that have guided Indian statecraft since independence.

Whether one attributes this departure to external pressure, domestic political compulsions, or the personal vulnerabilities of the Prime Minister, the outcome for India is catastrophic. India is left with a weakened strategic posture, lost economic opportunities, and a diminished reputation as a country that used to stand by its commitments and defended its interests with confidence. As stated above, this is nothing short of treason.

The people of India deserve a government that negotiates from a position of principle and strength, one that fiercely protects their interests rather than sacrificing them timidly on the altar of political accommodation and personal weaknesses. PM Modi has utterly and shamefully failed to honour the trust reposed in him. This is not merely a felony but an unpardonable sin against the nation. In such a scenario, when a growing section of the people condemns him as a traitor, they are not wrong. They may, in fact, be rendering the most honest verdict on this Prime Minister.

The author is General Secretary and Chief Spokesperson, Chandigarh Pradesh Congress Committee

Note: - This is the first part of the series of write up on “12 years of broken promises”. The subsequent write-ups will come up in subsequent issues.