India Acts North: Centrality of Central Asia in India’s Eurasian Ambitions
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For India, Central Asia is no longer simply a region of historical and civilisational connections. It is increasingly becoming a critical arena in its engagement with the wider Eurasian order. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent visit to Uzbekistan and his participation in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Bishkek demonstrate this.
In Tashkent, India elevated its relationship with Uzbekistan to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (CSP) while at the SCO, India used the SCO platform to engage the major Eurasian powers and Central Asian states on security, connectivity and economic opportunity. The two engagements together demonstrate the centrality of Central Asia in India’s Eurasian ambitions. The evolution of India Uzbekistan strategic partnership exhibits the shifts in last one and a half decade.
The 2011 Strategic Partnership and Subsequent Momentum
The 2011 Strategic Partnership formally elevated India-Uzbekistan relations beyond conventional diplomatic and economic cooperation based on equality and mutual understanding. It established political and security architecture, but the economic and regional dimensions had not yet acquired the importance they have currently.
A second phase began with PM Modi’s visits to Uzbekistan in 2015 and 2016. Counter-terrorism, defence and cyber security acquired greater prominence, giving the partnership greater political and security substance. At the same time, India’s Connect Central Asia policy was developing, making Uzbekistan increasingly important not only as a bilateral partner but also as a potential anchor for India’s wider Central Asian engagement.
The transformation of Uzbekistan under President Shavkat Mirziyoyev after 2016 created further opportunities. Economic opening, greater receptivity to foreign investment and more active regional diplomacy provided India with a favorable environment.
President Mirziyoyev’s visits to India in 2018 and 2019 generated agreements in science and technology, agriculture, tourism, military education, healthcare, pharmaceuticals and space. The 2019 Security Cooperation Agreement further institutionalised cooperation against terrorism and organised crime.
From Bilateral to Regional Partnership
The beginning of India-Central Asia Dialogue in 2019 at the level of Foreign Ministers and the January 2022 India-Central Asia Summit marked another shift. Cooperation increasingly moved beyond the bilateral relationship into a wider regional framework. After return of the Taliban in Kabul in August 2021, India organised the first India-Central Asia Meeting of National Security Advisers (NSAs) and Secretaries of Security Councils on December 6, 2022, in New Delhi.
Uzbekistan emerged as one of the principal pillars of India’s Central Asia strategy, while the bilateral agenda expanded to healthcare, education, pharmaceuticals, information technology, infrastructure and development cooperation.
2026: The Comprehensive Strategic Partnership
The India-Uzbekistan Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, first such initiative in Central Asia announced in August 2026 represents the culmination of this fifteen-year evolution, but it also begins a more demanding phase. The new framework covers trade and investment, transport connectivity, digital transformation, IT, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, energy transition, critical minerals, food security, healthcare, pharmaceuticals and education.
Critical minerals became particularly important because Uzbekistan’s resource potential intersects with India’s requirements in advanced manufacturing, energy transition and defence production.
Its most important change is institutional. A Foreign Ministers-led coordination mechanism will provide high-level oversight, while the Inter-Governmental Commission is being elevated to the ministerial level. The two countries have set a target of taking bilateral trade to $5 billion by 2030. Long-term uranium supplies from Uzbekistan would further strengthen India’s energy security.
Eurasian connectivity is equally important for both. Uzbekistan is one of the only two landlocked countries in the world while India never had direct access to Eurasia after 1947, ever since Pakistan was created. If realised, initiatives like Chabahar port and International North South Transport Corridor will help India and Uzbekistan to overcome their geographical handicap in Eurasia.
Uzbekistan’s geographical centrality gives its partnership with India a significance beyond bilateral ties. Sharing borders with every other Central Asian republic, Uzbekistan can serve as a regional gateway for India. Improved connectivity with Tashkent could, thus, help India overcome its limited physical access to Central Asia and connect more effectively with the region’s markets, energy resources and transport networks. This is the reason why PM Modi said that Uzbekistan is at the heart of Central Asia. Security cooperation, including counterterrorism, intelligence sharing and defence, remains an important foundation.
The partnership also carries a wider regional meaning. Cooperation on rehabilitation of the Aral Sea, supported by a $1 million Indian grant, adds an environmental and developmental dimension to India’s Central Asian diplomacy. The two countries have also committed themselves to closer coordination within the SCO and to advancing the interests of the Global South.
The real test begins now. India-Uzbekistan political relations have often moved faster than trade and investment. The $5 billion trade target, uranium cooperation, critical-mineral projects, transport corridors and digital partnerships will show whether the CSP can turn political trust into strategic delivery.
India, Central Asia and the SCO
From Tashkent, PM Modi travelled to Bishkek for the 26th SCO summit, marking 25 years of its inception. The sequence was diplomatically useful. Uzbekistan represented the deepening of a bilateral relationship; the SCO represented India’s engagement with the larger Eurasian space.
As a founding member of SCO, Uzbekistan had been supportive of India’s membership in the organisation. India had signed the Memorandum of Obligations (MoO) for joining the SCO on June 24, 2016, at Tashkent SCO Summit attended by PM Modi.
India’s stated vision for the SCO centred on security, connectivity and opportunity, with particular emphasis on combating cross border terrorism and achieving sustainable people centric connectivity.
Regular meetings through the India-Uzbekistan Joint Working Group on Counter Terrorism lead to direct exchanges of tactical data on terrorist networks, financing, and radicalisation. These insights feed into the broader multilateral framework of SCO-Regional Anti-Terror Structure (RATS), permanently headquartered in Tashkent.
Bilateral consensus between New Delhi and Tashkent against state-sponsored and cross-border terrorism helps eliminate diplomatic roadblocks within the SCO, allowing RATS to adopt firmer, clearer resolutions against regional terror groups.
Afghanistan remains another critical link between India’s Central Asian engagement and its wider Eurasian ambitions. At the Bishkek SCO summit, PM Modi reiterated that India would continue its development and humanitarian assistance to the Afghan people and stressed that a peaceful and secure Afghanistan is closely linked to the goal of a peaceful and secure Eurasia.
For India, this is significant because Afghanistan connects South Asia with Central Asia, and developments in Afghanistan have security and economic implications for both, India and Central Asia. Three Central Asian countries, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan share a border with Afghanistan. For India, Afghanistan and Central Asia form part of the same strategic space.
India’s cooperation with Uzbekistan on Afghanistan, hence, acquires a wider strategic significance. The two countries had also cooperated closely in the late 1990s in supporting the Northern Alliance.
PM Modi’s presence at SCO also gave India an opportunity to demonstrate that it can operate within an institution where Russia and China exercise considerable influence without becoming part of any bloc and thus, exercise its strategic autonomy. New Delhi can work with Moscow, engage Beijing, interact with Central Asian states, Iran, Belarus and sit across the table from Pakistan while retaining its own strategic choices.
The bilateral diplomacy around the summit reinforced this approach.
India’s unique position as a bridge between the West and East was clearly visible during the summit. PM Modi urged an end to the Ukraine war in his interaction with Russian President Vladimir Putin. On the other hand, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian urged India to use its wide-ranging contacts with the US and Israel to help steer them away from conflict.
Much like India, Central Asian countries also practice a multi-directional foreign policy to preserve their strategic flexibility amidst the great power competition in Eurasia. For the Central Asian countries, India is a trusted country with whom they have historical links and New Delhi provides them an alternative (beyond Russia and China) in the Eurasian region. That is one of the reasons they supported SCO expansion and inclusion of India in it.
The significance of the Tashkent-Bishkek journey lies in what it reveals about the changing place of Central Asia in India’s foreign policy. Much like centrality of ASEAN in India’s Indo-Pacific vision, Central Asia is emerging as central to India’s Eurasian strategy.
Disclaimer: Views expressed are of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Statecraft Institute.