Why India Is Investing in Islands: From Great Nicobar to Seychelles: The New Geography of Indian Power

 

Why Tiny Islands Suddenly Matter So Much

At first glance, it seems difficult to understand. Why would a country as large as India devote increasing diplomatic attention, strategic investment, and political capital to islands whose populations are smaller than many Indian towns? Why does a visit by the Prime Minister to Seychelles attract strategic attention far beyond the Indian Ocean? Why are places such as Great Nicobar, Agaléga, Mauritius, the Maldives, and Seychelles appearing with growing frequency in discussions on India's foreign policy, maritime security, and Indo-Pacific strategy? These islands occupy only tiny spaces on a map, yet they are quietly becoming some of the most valuable pieces of geopolitical real estate in the twenty-first century.

The answer lies in a simple reality that has shaped history for centuries but is once again returning to the centre of global strategy. Geography still matters. For much of the post-Cold War period, globalization encouraged the belief that technology, finance, and digital connectivity had reduced the importance of physical geography. Information travelled instantly across continents. Businesses managed global supply chains with unprecedented efficiency. Financial markets operated across time zones. The world appeared increasingly borderless. Yet beneath this rapidly globalizing economy, one reality remained unchanged. Every container ship carrying manufactured goods, every tanker transporting crude oil, every naval vessel safeguarding maritime trade, and thousands of submarine communication cables carrying the world's digital traffic continued to depend upon the oceans. Globalization may have become digital, but it never stopped being maritime.

This renewed appreciation of geography explains why the Indian Ocean has returned to the centre of international attention. Stretching between the energy-producing Gulf region, the manufacturing economies of East Asia, the rapidly growing markets of Africa, and the consumer economies of Europe, the Indian Ocean has become one of the world's most important strategic corridors. A substantial share of global trade, energy supplies, and container traffic passes through its waters every day. Some of the world's most critical maritime chokepoints—including the Strait of Hormuz, the Bab el-Mandeb, and the Strait of Malacca—connect through this vast oceanic network, making it indispensable to the functioning of the global economy. Any disruption along these routes can affect energy prices, manufacturing supply chains, insurance costs, and international commerce far beyond the region itself.

Beyond ships and energy, the Indian Ocean also carries something far less visible but equally indispensable—the world's digital connectivity. More than 95 percent of international internet traffic travels not through satellites but through submarine fibre-optic cables laid across the ocean floor. These cables transmit financial transactions, cloud computing services, video calls, e-commerce, banking networks, scientific data, government communications, and the digital infrastructure that powers the global economy. Damage to a major cable—whether caused by accidents, natural disasters, or deliberate sabotage—can disrupt communications, financial markets, and business operations across multiple countries. As economies become increasingly digital, protecting maritime routes is no longer only about safeguarding ships carrying oil or cargo. It is also about securing the invisible information networks that connect governments, businesses, and billions of people every day.

This changing strategic landscape has transformed the value of islands. Places once viewed primarily as tourist destinations or remote territories are increasingly recognized as critical nodes within a much larger maritime system. Their importance no longer depends on population size or land area but on location. Islands positioned near major shipping routes can support maritime surveillance, humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, search-and-rescue operations, logistics, naval deployments, and domain awareness across vast stretches of ocean. In an era where economic security and national security are becoming increasingly interconnected, geography has once again become a strategic asset.

India's recent diplomatic engagement with island nations should therefore be viewed through this wider lens. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Seychelles is not simply another bilateral engagement between two friendly countries. It reflects a broader strategic understanding that India's security and prosperity are increasingly linked to the wider Indian Ocean rather than only to its continental borders. Partnerships with island nations are becoming part of a long-term effort to strengthen maritime cooperation, improve regional connectivity, support capacity building, enhance coastal surveillance, and contribute to a stable and secure Indo-Pacific. The significance of these relationships lies not in the size of the countries involved but in the geography they occupy.

This strategic shift is not unique to India. Around the world, governments are rediscovering the importance of maritime geography. The United States continues to strengthen its Indo-Pacific partnerships. China has expanded its maritime presence through port investments and infrastructure initiatives stretching across the Indian Ocean. European powers have renewed interest in freedom of navigation and secure sea lanes, while countries such as Japan and Australia have deepened their engagement across the wider Indo-Pacific. Increasingly, the competition is no longer centred only on territorial expansion or military alliances. It is also about securing access, building partnerships, protecting supply chains, and maintaining a stable maritime order across some of the world's busiest oceans.

Understanding this transformation requires looking beyond individual diplomatic visits or infrastructure projects. Seychelles is only one chapter in a much larger story. The same strategic logic that explains India's engagement with Seychelles also explains its growing partnerships with Mauritius, its interest in Agaléga, its relationship with the Maldives and Sri Lanka, and the increasing importance of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. These developments are often discussed separately, yet they are connected by a single strategic idea. India is gradually building a maritime outlook that extends far beyond defending its coastline. It is preparing for a century in which influence will increasingly depend upon the ability to secure the oceans that connect the world's trade, energy, technology, and information.

Few places illustrate this transformation more clearly than Great Nicobar. Situated at the eastern edge of the Indian Ocean, close to one of the world's busiest maritime corridors, the island has moved from being a distant frontier to becoming one of the most strategically significant locations in India's long-term maritime vision. Understanding why requires looking not only at Great Nicobar itself, but at the larger maritime strategy that is quietly reshaping India's role in the Indo-Pacific.

Great Nicobar and the Rise of India's Maritime Strategy

If Seychelles explains why India is investing in island partnerships, Great Nicobar explains how India intends to translate geography into long-term strategic capability. Located at the southern tip of the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago, barely a few hundred kilometres from the Strait of Malacca, Great Nicobar occupies one of the most consequential locations in the Indo-Pacific. Every day, thousands of commercial vessels carrying energy supplies, manufactured goods, and raw materials pass through one of the world's busiest maritime corridors before moving toward East Asia or the Indian Ocean. Few locations provide such proximity to a route that influences both regional security and the global economy. Geography has placed Great Nicobar at the crossroads of commerce, connectivity, and strategy.

This strategic location explains why the Great Nicobar Development Project has attracted far greater attention than a conventional infrastructure initiative. Public discussions often focus on the proposed transshipment port, airport, power infrastructure, or urban development. While these components are important, they represent only part of a much larger picture. The project reflects India's effort to develop maritime infrastructure capable of supporting trade, logistics, connectivity, disaster response, and strategic mobility in one of the world's most important oceanic regions. As global shipping expands and supply chains become increasingly diversified, infrastructure located close to major sea lanes acquires value that extends well beyond commercial activity. Ports are no longer simply places where ships dock. They have become strategic gateways connecting trade, security, and diplomacy.

Great Nicobar also complements one of India's most distinctive strategic assets—the Andaman and Nicobar Command, the country's only integrated tri-service command bringing together the Army, Navy, and Air Force under a unified operational structure. Its location provides India with a unique vantage point overlooking the eastern approaches to the Indian Ocean and the western entrance to the Strait of Malacca. This does not imply control over international shipping, nor should it. Rather, it provides enhanced maritime domain awareness, improved coordination for humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, faster operational response across the eastern Indian Ocean, and greater capacity to contribute to regional maritime security. In modern geopolitics, awareness can be as valuable as presence, and presence can be as important as power.

Seen in isolation, Great Nicobar may appear to be a domestic infrastructure project. Viewed alongside India's wider island partnerships, however, a larger strategic pattern begins to emerge. To the west, India has strengthened its partnership with Mauritius, including cooperation associated with Agaléga, enhancing connectivity and maritime capacity in the southwestern Indian Ocean. Further north, longstanding ties with Seychelles have expanded through cooperation in coastal surveillance, maritime security, capacity building, and the development of regional maritime awareness. India's engagement with the Maldives and Sri Lanka similarly reflects the importance of secure sea lanes and a stable maritime neighbourhood. Although each relationship has its own history and priorities, together they contribute to a broader network of partnerships stretching across the Indian Ocean rather than remaining confined to India's coastline.

This expanding maritime outlook is also reflected in the evolution of India's strategic doctrine. In 2015, India articulated the vision of SAGAR—Security and Growth for All in the Region, emphasizing maritime cooperation, collective security, and inclusive regional development across the Indian Ocean. More recently, this thinking has evolved further through MAHASAGAR—Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions. While the names differ, the strategic progression is significant. The focus is no longer limited to securing India's immediate maritime neighbourhood. It increasingly recognizes that prosperity, resilience, humanitarian cooperation, blue economy initiatives, disaster response, sustainable development, and maritime security are interconnected across a much wider Indo-Pacific and Global South landscape. India's maritime vision is gradually expanding from coastal defence toward comprehensive regional engagement.

This broader strategy reflects a changing understanding of national power itself. For much of modern history, countries often measured strategic strength through the size of their territory or the scale of their armed forces. In today's interconnected world, influence increasingly depends upon connectivity, logistics, resilient supply chains, maritime partnerships, technological capabilities, and the ability to contribute to regional stability. Ports, shipping corridors, island partnerships, submarine cables, and maritime infrastructure have become as strategically important as roads, railways, and airports were to earlier generations. Nations that can help secure these networks contribute not only to their own national interests but also to the stability of international commerce upon which the global economy depends.

Viewed through this lens, Great Nicobar is not merely another infrastructure project, just as Seychelles is not simply another diplomatic destination. They represent different components of the same strategic vision. One strengthens India's physical maritime capabilities. The other strengthens its diplomatic partnerships across the Indian Ocean. Together with initiatives such as SAGAR and MAHASAGAR, they reveal a country that is gradually redefining how it understands geography, security, and regional leadership. India's strategic horizon is no longer measured only by the length of its coastline. It is increasingly measured by the oceans that connect it to the wider world.

That broader maritime vision also explains why developments in the Indian Ocean cannot be understood without considering another major actor whose presence across these waters has expanded steadily over the past two decades. Any discussion of India's island strategy ultimately intersects with the larger geopolitical transformation taking place across the Indo-Pacific, where maritime infrastructure, ports, shipping routes, and strategic partnerships have become central to the evolving relationship between India and China.

The Indian Ocean Is Returning to the Centre of World History

No discussion of India's evolving maritime strategy is complete without acknowledging another transformation unfolding across the Indian Ocean. Over the past two decades, China has significantly expanded its economic, commercial, and strategic presence across the wider Indo-Pacific through infrastructure investments, port development, maritime connectivity projects, and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Ports associated with Chinese investment—from Gwadar in Pakistan and Hambantota in Sri Lanka to facilities in Myanmar and East Africa—have attracted sustained international attention because they illustrate how maritime infrastructure is becoming an increasingly important instrument of national strategy. While many of these projects are commercial in nature, policymakers around the world also examine their potential long-term strategic implications. The debate is therefore less about individual ports and more about the broader relationship between infrastructure, connectivity, commerce, and geopolitical influence.

India's maritime response should be understood within this wider strategic context rather than as a reaction to any single country. Like many major maritime powers, India recognizes that the Indian Ocean is no longer simply a body of water separating continents. It is the principal highway connecting the energy resources of the Gulf, the manufacturing economies of East Asia, the rapidly expanding markets of Africa, and the consumer economies of Europe. A substantial share of global trade, energy supplies, container traffic, and digital communication carried through submarine cables depends upon the uninterrupted functioning of these sea lanes. Securing this maritime ecosystem has therefore become an economic necessity as much as a strategic responsibility. The objective is not merely to project power but to help preserve the stability upon which international commerce depends.

This explains why India's investments in Great Nicobar, its partnerships with Seychelles, Mauritius, the Maldives, and Sri Lanka, and its broader MAHASAGAR vision should be viewed as interconnected elements of a long-term maritime strategy rather than isolated policy initiatives. Together, they reflect a recognition that influence in the twenty-first century will increasingly depend upon maritime connectivity, resilient infrastructure, trusted partnerships, humanitarian cooperation, disaster response capabilities, and the ability to contribute to a secure Indo-Pacific. The Indian Ocean is no longer simply India's neighbourhood. It is becoming one of the principal arenas in which the future balance of economic and strategic influence will be shaped.

The significance of this transformation extends well beyond governments and navies. Every smartphone connected through undersea fibre-optic cables, every container carrying manufactured goods across continents, every energy shipment crossing the Arabian Sea, every supply chain linking Asian factories with European markets, and every humanitarian mission responding to disasters in the region ultimately depends upon the security and openness of the Indian Ocean. Maritime strategy is therefore no longer a subject confined to defence planners. It increasingly influences economic resilience, energy security, technological connectivity, global trade, food supplies, insurance costs, and the everyday functioning of an interconnected world. The oceans that once appeared distant from daily life have become central to it.

History offers an interesting perspective on this shift. For centuries, the Mediterranean served as the centre of commerce, diplomacy, and strategic competition between great powers. The Atlantic later emerged as the defining ocean of the modern industrial era, connecting Europe and North America while shaping global trade and geopolitics for much of the twentieth century. Today, as economic growth, manufacturing capacity, technological innovation, and energy flows increasingly converge across Asia and the Indo-Pacific, the centre of gravity is gradually shifting once again. The Indian Ocean is quietly reclaiming a position it historically occupied when ancient trade routes connected East Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, the Indian subcontinent, and Southeast Asia long before the modern nation-state emerged.

This changing geography helps explain why islands that once appeared remote are becoming strategically indispensable. Great Nicobar, Seychelles, Mauritius, Agaléga, the Maldives, and other island territories are no longer simply points on a map or destinations for tourism. They are emerging as critical nodes within an interconnected maritime network linking trade, logistics, digital infrastructure, energy security, humanitarian cooperation, and strategic stability. Their value lies not in their size but in their location, and in an era where geography is once again shaping global politics, location has become one of the world's most valuable strategic assets.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Seychelles should therefore be understood as more than a routine diplomatic engagement. It reflects India's broader recognition that the future of its security, prosperity, and global influence will increasingly be shaped by the oceans that surround it. The Great Nicobar Project, the Andaman and Nicobar Command, partnerships with island nations, and the evolution from SAGAR to MAHASAGAR are all parts of the same strategic narrative. They illustrate a country gradually expanding its strategic horizon from protecting its coastline to engaging with the wider maritime region that connects Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.

For much of the twentieth century, the world's great powers looked toward continents to shape history. The twenty-first century is increasingly drawing attention back to the oceans. India's investments in islands are therefore not simply about expanding influence across the Indian Ocean. They reflect a larger strategic realization—that in an interconnected world, the countries that can connect, secure, and sustain the maritime networks linking continents will also help shape the future of global commerce, security, and geopolitics.

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Geopolitics Made Simple: The Complete Masterclass for India and the World

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