Russia - Central Asia-Caucasus Institute and Silk Road Studies ...

Russia 477
Russian-Indian ties have a long history – Afanasii Nikitin’s early journey
led eventually to the growth of Russian interest in India under Peter the
Great. Peter’s goal was to establish a direct route to India via Central
Asia’s turbulent lands. The first military-reconnaissance expeditions to
Central Asia (to Yarkand and Khiva; both failed) were organized in 1715
and 1717. Their aim was to explore possible water routes to India via the
Caspian Sea and Amu Darya River. Russian attention later turned from
India to Persia as a means of gaining a southern “window”. In due course
this project failed, but meanwhile Russia-India linkages were being
facilitated by Indians themselves. From the seventeenth century a
community of Indian traders in Astrakhan controlled the route from
Russia to India. By the 1730s Indian turnover of textiles, silk, jewelry, etc.
via this “terminal” exceeded all Russia’s Eastern trade. 11 It is interesting
to note that in the eighteenth century Indians preferred to send goods
northbound via Afghanistan and Iran rather than through Central Asia,
which was rendered insecure by the raids of Kazakh nomads.
Russian and then Soviet ties with India multiplied in the twentieth
century, especially following World War II, even though there were
many problems and tensions in what was in reality a marriage of
convenience. The breakup of the USSR brought deep changes to the
Russian-Indian partnership, and not all of these changes were
comfortable for both sides. Commodity turnover between Russia and
India fell by four-fifths in the early 1990s and annual bilateral trade (not
counting military items) fell to less than $1 billion until 1994, as compared
to $ 5.5 billion before 1991. By 1999 - 2000 the annual trade between the
countries reached only $ 1.5 billion.
By this time India had become a dynamic Asian superpower, yet one that
is dependent on energy resources and raw materials from abroad. Russia
is one of India’s most favorable sources for both. The export of Russian
energy grew, and Moscow meanwhile is moving to diversify its
commercial and economic relations with India. Both partners are
11 Petrukhintsev, N.N., “Orenburgskaia ekspeditsiia i ‘indiyskie’ plani
I.K.Kirillova,” Rossiia-India: perspectivy regionalnogo sotrudnichestva (Lipetskaia
oblast), Moscow, 2000, , p. 206-207.