The contours of independent India's engagement with Afghanistan bear the impression of both history and the changing hues of Afghanistan's internal sociopolitical landscape, as well as the larger regional geopolitical landscape. This chapter begins by laying out the historical evolution of relations between New Delhi and Kabul. It is argued that India's engagement with Afghanistan ought to be situated within the historical developments that surrounded the creation of the state of Pakistan in 1947, in particular, its troubled relationship with the frontier. The 1971 secession of East Pakistan was a critical watershed, animating Rawalpindi's strategic calculus and colouring its view of relations across the Durand Line, particularly through the prism of Kabul's engagement with New Delhi. Security interests have also been the most critical pivot of New Delhi's relationship with Afghanistan, particularly since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 -an event that triggered cataclysmic changes in Afghanistan's domestic affairs and the region's geopolitical landscape.

Subsequent alignments and re-alignments in New Delhi's Afghan policy over the last four odd decades have been a manifestation of its keen desire to protect its interests, which lie primarily in the domain of security. This raison d'être-with the exception of the first period of Taliban rule (1996-2001)—has underpinned New Delhi's engagement with regimes of varying ideological hues in Kabul. The challenges for New Delhi in pursuing this end has been magnified by the lack of geographical contiguity, coupled with an increasingly complex domestic Afghan and regional geopolitical environment. Its ongoing recalibration of policy towards the Afghan Taliban ought to be contextualised against this backdrop. However, the road ahead for New Delhi is punctuated by numerous challenges and a few windows of opportunity....