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India twice: first as the four-decade incumbent governor of Riyadh in
April 2010 (India, MEA 2010 ) and then as the Crown Prince in February
2014 (India, MEA 2014a, b); and his visit as King is expected sometime
in 2018. Furthermore, Riyadh hosted Foreign Ministers Pranab Mukherjee
in April 2008 and Salman Khurshid in May 2013. Surprisingly, Sushma
Swaraj, who had visited more countries in the first three years of her ten-
ure than any of her predecessors, had to wait until February 2018 to visit
the Kingdom.
The Indian accommodation of the Saudi interests and regional con-
cerns came to the forefront when New Delhi hosted Shaikh Khalid bin
Ahmed bin Mohamed al-Khalifa, the foreign minister of Bahrain, in March
2011 (India, MEA 2011b). A couple of days before al-Khalifa’s visit, the
Secretary General of the Saudi National Security Council Prince Bandar
bin-Sultan came and met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh (India, MEA
2011a). The timing and sequencing of both the visits are interesting. Only
a few weeks earlier the city centre in Manama witnessed a large mass dem-
onstration similar to the one seen in Tunis and Cairo which led to the
overthrowing of Zine el Abidine Ben-Ali and Hosni Mubarak respectively.
Thus, the visit of the Bahraini foreign minister to New Delhi could be
directly linked to the welfare of an estimated 400,000 Indians working in
the Kingdom. Their continued presence has been economically crucial for
India and for the long-term stability of Bahrain. A sudden departure of
Indian workers would have precipitated a crisis and plunged its already
vulnerable economy.
However, Prince Bandar’s visit days before al-Khalifa’s adds a twist.
Since protests began in Tahrir Square on 25 January 2011, Saudi Arabia
has been nervous over the Arab Spring. When similar demonstrations
started in Manama on 14 February, Riyadh was wary. The Shia- majority
Saudi eastern province has been witnessing periodic protests and unrests
since the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran. Therefore, under the ambit of
GCC’s Peninsula Shield Force (PSF), on 14 March Saudi troops crossed
the 25-km King Fahd Causeway that separates the two kingdoms and
entered Bahrain. And Prince Bandar’s New Delhi visit came less than two
weeks after Saudi Arabia demonstrated its determination to shore up sup-
port for the beleaguered Bahraini ruler.
However, the most visible manifestation of growing political ties was
the three state exchanges between the two countries, namely, the visits of
King Abdullah in January 2006 and of Prime Ministers Manmohan Singh
in March–April 2010 and of Prime Minister Modi in April 2016.
P. R. KUMARASWAMY AND MD. M. QUAMAR