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The Tuai River near Zokhawthar village was previously a key crossing point between Myanmar and India (Umar Altaf via Getty Images)
India may be ready to settle its Myanmar border on paper, only Naypyitaw cannot guarantee it on the ground.
India can redraw the border with Myanmar – but who controls it?India can redraw the border with Myanmar – but who controls it?
Reports that New Delhi is considering a small territorial exchange (Opens in new window) along the India–Myanmar frontier raise a question much larger than the disposition of a few square kilometres: what does a bilateral boundary agreement mean when the government signing it does not control all the territory it claims?
Indian officials (Opens in new window) have confirmed that discussions are underway (Opens in new window) over unresolved sectors of the 1,643-kilometre frontier, following reports that New Delhi is considering an exchange of roughly 1.4 square miles (3.6 square kilometres) around boundary pillars 65 to 68 in Manipur’s Chandel district. India’s Ministry of External Affairs has not confirmed that a territorial exchange has been agreed.
India’s rationale is clear. It wants to complete border demarcation, facilitate fencing and to curb insurgent movement, trafficking and irregular migration. But Myanmar’s fragmented political geography makes implementation considerably more complicated.
Formal sovereignty and operational control are increasingly different things in Myanmar.
Myanmar is the only ASEAN country sharing both land and maritime (Opens in new window) boundaries with India and remains the principal overland gateway connecting India’s northeast with Southeast Asia. New Delhi therefore needs functioning channels with Naypyitaw on border security, trade and connectivity.
It raises a bigger question about how diplomacy works when formal sovereignty and effective territorial control diverge.
Any boundary negotiated with Myanmar’s government still requires effective authority and some degree of acceptance from those controlling territory on the ground.
Naypyitaw remains an unavoidable state interlocutor. It is simply no longer the only actor capable of affecting Indian interests. For India, this is a border-management problem. But for the wider Indo-Pacific, it raises a bigger question about how diplomacy works when formal sovereignty and effective territorial control diverge.
India has compelling security reasons to settle its frontier. Myanmar’s instability (Opens in new window) has generated refugee flows into Mizoram and Manipur and created opportunities for Indian insurgent organisations to operate across the border. New Delhi has consequently moved to expand fencing and tighten the Free Movement Regime that historically permitted greater cross-border movement among frontier communities.
But even a small territorial adjustment carries substantial political risks.
India has compelling security reasons to settle its frontier (Umar Altaf via Getty Images)
The reported proposal has already drawn opposition from Manipur-based civil society groups, including COCOMI and Kuki Inpi Chandel, highlighting the sensitivity of changing a boundary in a state already fractured by years of ethnic violence and displacement. Chandel sits within a politically complex landscape involving Meitei, Naga and Kuki-Zo (Opens in new window) interests. Border communities also maintain historical, ethnic and familial connections across the international frontier. A geographically minor adjustment could acquire political significance far greater than its size.
India’s 2015 Land Boundary Agreement (Opens in new window) with Bangladesh demonstrated that complicated territorial anomalies can be resolved through sustained bilateral diplomacy. But Myanmar presents a different challenge: an agreement with the central government does not necessarily guarantee implementation in contested territory.
India’s expanding engagement (Opens in new window) with Min Aung Hlaing’s administration must then form part of a wider Myanmar strategy. India cannot secure its frontier or pursue its Act East policy by pretending Naypyitaw (Opens in new window) does not exist. The risk arises when state-to-state diplomacy becomes a substitute for dealing with actors exercising effective control over territory relevant to Indian interests.
India should continue negotiating formal boundary arrangements with Naypyitaw while expanding pragmatic engagement with ethnic armed organisations, local authorities and border communities. Such engagement need not amount to political recognition. It could focus on humanitarian access, border security, infrastructure, local trade and connectivity in areas where these actors exercise effective control.
India’s dilemma is not unique. ASEAN and other Indo-Pacific governments face a similar problem in Myanmar: formal diplomacy necessarily deals with recognised state institutions even as political and territorial authority becomes increasingly dispersed.
The challenge is not whether to abandon state-to-state diplomacy, but how to supplement it. Humanitarian access, infrastructure and security arrangements may require practical engagement with consequential actors on the ground, without conferring political recognition upon them.
About the author
Saima Afzal
Saima Afzal is a researcher specialising in South Asian security, counterterrorism, and broader geopolitical dynamics across the Middle East, Afghanistan, and the Indo-Pacific.
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