We have always mistaken articulation of naive platitudes as practice of foreign policy. Remember Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai? And Panchsheel? And closer to our times, Natwar Singh, before he was sacked by Sonia Gandhi, petulantly saying that we should approach NAM (Gawd ! In this day and age!). And our citing the mid-wifery of Bangladesh only to be fobbed off by Bagladeshis? Similarly, our attitude to the Tibetans - we neither challenged China nor supported the Dalai Lama. The latest fiasco in Nepal - even a schoolchild could have foreseen that not backing the king was a fatal mistake.
Chacha Nehru, with his typical head-in-the-clouds personality, laid a weak moralistic foundation for running a ministry that is all about realpolitic. We're still paying the price for it.
Also, let's face it, Hinduism is an other-worldly religion which due to the sheer preponderance of Hindus in this country, impacts our strategic thinking, even though we profess to be what passes for secular.
