Will India’s Modi break the ice with Pakistan in his third term?

It’s unlikely, say analysts. India has little incentive to seek to improve ties with Pakistan at the moment.

Islamabad, Pakistan –  As Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was sworn in for a third time as his country’s leader on June 9, seven counterparts from neighbouring nations joined a very select audience in marking the moment.

The setting — a summer evening, with an orangish dusk sky, and handpicked leaders from the region in attendance — carried echoes of Modi’s first oath-taking ceremony as India’s premier in 2014, which was repeated in 2019.

But there was one big difference from 2014: Missing from the lineup of visiting leaders was the prime minister of Pakistan.

A decade ago, images of Pakistan’s then-Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif clasping Modi’s hands during his visit to attend the swearing-in event signalled a fresh hope for long-tortured India-Pakistan relations — hope that subsequent setbacks to ties have all but extinguished. Now, as Modi begins his third term in office, with a sharply reduced mandate that has left him dependent on coalition allies to stay in power, analysts expect the Indian leader to pursue a tough posture towards Pakistan, with little incentive to seek any easing in tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

“Modi will reach out to regional neighbours, all of whom were invited to his swearing-in.  But not Pakistan,” said Maleeha Lodhi, former Pakistani ambassador to the United Nations, United States and the United Kingdom. “His government is likely to continue its hard line towards Pakistan with which he has shown no interest to engage for the past five years. This is unlikely to change.”