India’s maritime neighbours

Neighbours across the sea

A maritime neighbour is a country that faces another across a shared sea or ocean, even if no land border joins them. India, with the sea on three sides and a coastline of about 11,100 km, has many. For centuries the ocean was a highway: from a few centuries BCE Indian traders sailed to Java, Sumatra and Malaya in search of gold, and called these lands Suvarṇabhūmi, the ‘golden land’.

Sri Lanka and the Maldives

Sri Lanka lies southeast of India, only about 32 km away across the Palk Strait. Buddhism reached it in the 3rd century BCE with Mahendra and Sanghamitrā, Emperor Aśhoka’s son and daughter, and Hindu epics travelled there too. During the civil war from the mid-1980s to about 2010, many Tamil families moved to Tamil Nadu. Today the two countries cooperate in trade, culture and security.

The Maldives, over 1,100 islets, lies about 130 km from Minicoy in Lakshadweep. Its coconut curries and roshi, its Boduberu dance and many Dhivehi words show south Indian roots: raajje (king) and mas (fish) echo the Sanskrit rājā and matsya. India was among the first to recognise the Maldives on its independence in 1965 and helped it in the 2004 tsunami, the 2014 Malé water crisis and COVID-19. Rising seas threaten the islands, and the Maldives has joined the International Solar Alliance started by India.

Southeast Asia

Thailand shares a sea boundary with India. Its Dvāravatī culture was named after Dvārakā and its Ayutthayā kingdom after Ayodhyā, its kings of the Chakri dynasty are all named Rama, and Bangkok’s airport is called Suvarnabhumi. The India–Myanmar–Thailand Trilateral Highway will link the countries by road. Malaysia adopted a Brāhmī-based script around the 4th century CE; about 9% of its people are of Indian origin. Singapore, named from Singapuram, the ‘lion city’, has Tamil as an official language and a Little India; it is among the biggest foreign investors in India. Indonesia, an archipelago of a few large islands and more than 17,000 small ones, puts Garuḍa on its currency, performs the Rāmāyaṇa, and is home to the Borobudur Stūpa.

Iran and Oman

To the west, Iran has been linked to India since the Bronze Age. The Avesta, the sacred text of Zoroastrianism, has parallels with the Ṛigveda, Persian served as a court language in India, and India is helping Iran develop the port of Chabahar. Oman, the ‘land of copper’, traded with the Harappans over 5,000 years ago; over 10% of its people are of Indian origin, and in the Gulf it is India’s nearest defence partner.

Facing the sea together

On 26 December 2004 an undersea earthquake near Indonesia set off a tsunami that killed more than 200,000 people across the region, about 15,000 of them in India. India then joined Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Thailand and others to set up a warning network, and the Indian Tsunami Early Warning Centre in Hyderabad now alerts neighbours too.

Why it matters

Most of India’s trade travels by sea, so friendly maritime neighbours mean safe sea lanes, trade and help in disasters. Compare with India’s land neighbours. Answers to the textbook questions are in the NCERT solutions for Part 2 Chapter 2; see all of Part 2 Chapter 2 notes.