PYQ Vault · Paper 2 · India & the Nuclear Question
Examine the evolution of India’s role in the global nuclear order.
How the answer moves
The flow snapshot — the routes in, the body, the counter-view and the routes out.
Flow snapshot — how the answer moves
Intro routes
R!_ principled outsider → accommodated de facto power → never joined the central treaty k2 Pant: security « universal disarmament tension – India as first critic, then claimant
Body flow
early advocacy + institutions + implicit umbrellas (Kennedy) → 1974 PNE = latency → NPT rejected as “nuclear apartheid” (Jaswant Singh) → 1998 Pokhran-II = self-declared NWS → sanctions → normalisation → 2005-08 deal + 2008 NSG waiver → MTCR / Wassenaar / Australia Group + Chacko & Davis: “responsibility” reframed as equality – compliance as resistance
Counter-view
still outside NPT, CTBT, TPNW → order now unravelling = New START lapse (Feb 2026) + NPT credibility test (2026 RevCon) → clean record + regimes still sustain de facto power — but standing rests on great-power restraint India cannot command
Conclusion routes
R1 outside advocate → de facto power that turned exclusion into a case for reform → accepted in practice, apartinlaw 2 reframed responsibility as India’s lever > next test: holding its standing as the order decays
Model answer
Handwritten, in the form it would be written in the examination hall.
