India’s shift from Look East Policy to Act East Policy

Abstract

The domestic and international situation during the early 1990s compelled India to bring a shift in its earlier protectionist approach which resulted in underdevelopment, corruption, lack of infrastructure etc. That is why in 1991 the P V Narasimha Rao government decided to bring economic reforms and under this the government of India adopted the Look East Policy in order to look towards its East Asian neighbors via northeast. After a long period of time in 2014 the NDA government under PM Narendra Modi realized the changing regional and international scenario and therefore renamed the earlier LEP as the “Act East Policy’. Under this new version of the LEP, government of India have now been given active focus on the development of India’s northeast through increasing trade, economic, cultural cooperation with East Asia. Besides, one major cause for this modification is to contain China in this region. It is in this background the present paper focuses on the evolution of India’s LEP and its objectives. The paper also throws light on the Objectives of the Act East Policy and the differences between these two.