Why India Is Focussing On Myanmar As Part Of Its Act East Policy

India's engagement with Myanmar has seen high-level exchanges in the last few days, including a visit by Myanmar President Min Aung Hlaing to New Delhi in June this year. Hlaing, who recently transitioned from military chief to civilian president, met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi. He also met External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval.

The engagement continued at the 23rd National Level Meeting between the two countries, held in New Delhi on July 7 and 8, where the Indian side was led by Govind Mohan (Home Secretary) and the Myanmar side was led by Min Thu. India and Myanmar have decided to enhance cooperation in tackling terror threats, insurgency, drugs, cross-border crimes, etc. In addition, both nations have reiterated their commitment to ensuring stability in the border area, which remains sensitive.

A Strategic Pivot Point

PM Modi explicitly positioned Myanmar at the intersection of three of India's signature foreign policy doctrines, Neighbourhood First, Act East, and the recently articulated MAHASAGAR (Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions) framework – underscoring New Delhi's view that stable ties with Naypyidaw are non-negotiable for its regional ambitions.

Jaishankar and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval both separately called on the Myanmar President, signalling the breadth of India's engagement and the weight New Delhi attaches to the relationship at this juncture. The level of exchanges is set to grow and continue with New Delhi's sustained engagement with its eastern neighbour despite the country's prolonged political crisis.

Dr Cchavi Vasisht, Associate Fellow at the Centre for Geopolitics and Strategic Studies at the Chintan Research Foundation, says, "The recent high-level engagements signal a willingness on India's part to adopt a more nuanced, multi-track approach to Myanmar. However, "elevating engagement" must be understood not as a blanket endorsement of all actors but as a pragmatic, interest-driven strategy that balances principled support for democratic norms with pragmatic security imperatives."

"India's Act East Policy has always recognised Myanmar's centrality, but the current geopolitical context is compelling a sharper focus. With Bangladesh's evolving partnership with China, it is essential to recalibrate relations with the new government in Bangladesh, and surely MEA is looking into it. Myanmar offers a more direct and strategically manageable route to ASEAN, albeit one that is currently complicated by internal instability. The policy response should be to double down on Myanmar as a primary axis of the Act East Policy, while maintaining Bangladesh as a complementary partner," Dr Vasisht added.

Why Myanmar Matters

Myanmar sits in a strategically important position and shares a 1,643-kilometre-long border with India across four northeastern states of India – Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram. Both countries share a heritage of religious, linguistic and ethnic ties. Furthermore, Myanmar is the only ASEAN country adjoining India and, therefore, India's gateway to Southeast Asia. India is seeking to enhance its cooperation with Myanmar in line with our 'Act East' and 'Neighbourhood First' policies.  

Kachin State in Myanmar, which shares a border with Arunachal Pradesh, is the world's largest source of rare earths, and while India's trade with Myanmar has grown, there is scope to expand in areas like rare earths, which are critical for India's economic and national security. In 2021, China imported US$200 million of rare earths from Myanmar in December 2021, exceeding 20,000 tonnes.

Since the signing of the India-Myanmar trade agreement in 1970, bilateral trade has grown steadily. India is the fourth largest trading partner of Myanmar and there is a lot of scope for expansion of trade relations with Myanmar as India seeks to expand trade partnerships for critical mineral supplies by focussing on nations that have resources which India can look at for its own needs. India can definitely look at Myanmar if it seeks to diversify its supplies.

Myanmar, with its reserves of Heavy Rare Earth Elements (HREE), is therefore very much an option for supplying India and augmenting the country's diversified sources of rare earths.

Speaking on this possibility, Dr Cchavi Vasisht says, "This physical reality is compounded by the urgent need for upstream access to heavy rare earth minerals, particularly dysprosium and terbium, concentrated in Kachin and Shan States, which are critical for India's emerging focus on EV policy and defence industrial programmes and for diverting resources from China's near-monopoly over global supply chains."

"At the same time, China's deepening footprint in the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC) and its ambition to shape regional connectivity via proposing the BCMC present a structural challenge that India cannot afford to ignore, making Myanmar's alignment a zero-sum question," Dr Vasisht adds.

What Are The Challenges?

Even though India has been stepping up engagement with the National Unity Government of Myanmar, in border areas adjacent to India, the Ethnic Armed Organisations exert control, and therefore India also has to factor in the presence and control of non-state actors or Ethnic Armed Organisations (EAOs) in the region. While the Tatmadaw (Myanmar's military) has had some successes recently in the Chin State, the resultant implications are significant not only for Myanmar but also for neighbouring India and Bangladesh.

"India must engage, and the engagement has been there at the security agencies' level as well. Post 2021, work is already under process in this direction. Even Northeast states, such as Chief Minister Lalduhoma has acknowledged 'good relations' with the Arakan Army. Along with maintaining state-to-state relations, it is a strategic imperative given the reality on the ground has changed with EAOs, particularly those controlling the India-Myanmar borderlands in Rakhine, Chin, and northern Sagaing. They now exercise de facto governance and security functions in areas that directly affect India's border stability and connectivity projects," Dr Chhavi Vasisht says.

The successes of the Chin National Army (CNA) and Chinland Defence Force (CDF) over the years have left India with additional stakeholders to deal with and negotiate with in Chin State, even as the Myanmar military is making some comebacks in the area. The Arakan Army operates mainly in Rakhine State. However, this EAO maintains a significant presence and operational footprint in parts of southern Chin State and remains a key player in the region.

India's presence in Sittwe and the ambitious and strategically important Kaladan Multi-Modal Transit Transport are dependent on the security situation in the Chin State of Myanmar and have ramifications for India's northeast region. The project includes a waterways component of 158 km on the Kaladan River from Sittwe to Paletwa in Myanmar and a road component of 109 km from Paletwa to Zorinpui on the India-Myanmar border in Mizoram State. The waterways component comprises Sittwe Port, Inland Water Transport (IWT) terminals, backup facilities and navigational channels.

The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and its affiliated People's Defence Forces (PDFs) have gained control of a lot of areas in Kachin State that border India along Arunachal Pradesh's east, and India will have to keep an eye on the region, as China already has a huge presence in the area.

Commenting on the challenging nature of the security situation in the area, Dr Vasisht said, "The Arakan Army controls Sittwe's periphery and 14 of 17 Rakhine townships. The KIA controls sections of the Kachin-India border. Chin resistance groups hold large sections of the Chin-Mizoram borderland. India's security agencies have contacts with many of these groups; this has been true for years. What has not yet happened is the formalisation or deepening of those contacts into structured, strategic engagements with clear objectives around infrastructure protection, anti-Indian insurgent sanctuary denial, and border security cooperation."

"India must therefore develop a calibrated, pragmatic and interest-based engagement framework with EAOs that prioritises connectivity, border security, counter-trafficking cooperation, and local community stability without compromising India's stated commitment to Myanmar's sovereignty and territorial integrity. This should be pursued through both formal channels (via intelligence-sharing and security dialogues) and informal, track-II mechanisms that build trust with EAOs leaderships whose cooperation is essential," Dr Vasisht added.

Gateway To South East Asia

At the recent meeting between PM Modi and Hlaing, both sides revived emphasis on the India-Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral Highway, a project which has faced significant delays due to security and administrative hurdles.

PM Modi underlined that completing the corridor was essential for fostering regional prosperity. The India-Myanmar-Thailand (IMT) Trilateral Highway is a 1,360 km transnational road network designed to seamlessly connect Moreh, Manipur in India to Mae Sot, Thailand, via Mandalay and Naypyidaw in Myanmar. It is a cornerstone of India's Act East Policy intended to boost regional trade, tourism, and cultural integration. Not only will the highway lower transportation costs and transit times and help India access access wider ASEAN markets through the Northeast, the project is also expected to facilitate seamless cross-border movement of both passenger and cargo vehicles from India to Thailand.

In his meeting with Hlaing, PM Modi underlined that enhanced connectivity would foster mutually beneficial economic linkages and shared prosperity in the region.

"India's Act East Policy has always recognised Myanmar's centrality, but the current geopolitical context is compelling a sharper focus. With Bangladesh's evolving partnership with China, it is essential to recalibrate relations with the new government in Bangladesh, and surely MEA is looking into it," Dr Cchavi Vasisht said.

"Myanmar, offers a more direct and strategically manageable route to ASEAN, albeit one that is currently complicated by internal instability. The policy response should be to double down on Myanmar as a primary axis of the Act East Policy, while maintaining Bangladesh as a complementary partner, Dr. Vasisht added.

Myanmar Responds To India's Request

A coordination meeting on the India-Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral Highway Project and the Kaladan Multi-Modal Transit Transport Project was held in Naypyidaw on Thursday, which was attended by Hlaing himself. At this meeting, the president recalled his fruitful visit to New Delhi last month and highlighted the importance of the projects for improving regional connectivity, trade, investment, and economic cooperation among Myanmar, India and Thailand.

At the meeting, Hlaing said his government is committed to completing the strategically important highway projects linking Myanmar with neighbouring countries during its term and asked relevant agencies to accelerate implementation in their respective sectors.

The president concluded that opening border gates for official trade would contribute to national development and stressed the need to ensure security before construction activities continue.

Analysing the mood and the optics of the Myanmar president's visit to New Delhi, Dr Vasisht says, "What is encouraging is that the signals from New Delhi's diplomatic calendar in 2026 are broadly consistent with this logic. The PM Modi-Min Aung Hlaing summit, the Joint Statement's language on 'critical minerals, rare earths, energy, and mining sectors' signals India's intent to build an economic relationship with Myanmar that goes beyond border security and into the resource economy that China currently dominates.

"The Joint Statement's affirmation of the 'sovereignty and territorial integrity' of Myanmar and the shared commitment to 'peace, progress and prosperity' provides a normative framework for continued engagement that insulates India somewhat from the democratic legitimacy critique. And the 23rd National Level Meeting's explicit reaffirmation of Kaladan and the Trilateral Highway, within the framework of Neighbourhood First, Act East, and MAHASAGAR, suggests that the diplomatic machinery is now aligned behind these priorities," Dr Vasisht added.