Besides its desire to maintain power in Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union’s main focus was its Cold War with the US which took place in various theatres like the Caribbean (Cuba), in southern Africa, Indo-China, and eventually Afghanistan. As for India, being an economically and militarily weak country, its effort was to transform its economy through the chosen strategy of industrialisation from above. Its primary security interests lay in South Asia and the Indian Ocean Region was largely defensive. By supporting India on the issue of Kashmir, the Soviet Union took sides on the key Indian conflict—that with Pakistan which had become a military ally of the United States in 1954.
Soviet help had transformed China. According to John Garver the Soviet assistance to China’s socialist industrialisation effort “was one of the largest transfers of capital equipment in history.” Since a large focus was on building Chinese military power, the Soviets transferred technology of their latest fighters, submarines, tanks, artillery and ballistic missiles. The Soviets had no concept of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) and their transfer actually kick-started Chinese industrialisation.
India hoped for something similar, but though it got substantial Soviet aid, the process did not quite work out like China. And the main advantage of Soviet assistance was in the military side. India benefited by being able to get the licence production rights for MiG-21 fighter. The British refusal to give us submarine technology led to the Soviet supply of the first of the Foxtrot class submarines. In 1971, a largely Soviet supplied arsenal helped India to win the Bangladesh war.
When Indira Gandhi returned to power in 1980, she was acutely conscious of the need to move away from the Soviets, who had in December 1979 invaded Afghanistan. Indira believed that the political uprising against her in 1975 that led to the Emergency had had CIA support. She wanted to assure the US in 1980 that things had changed. Indian arms purchases were diversified to France (Mirage 2000) and Germany (HDW submarine) and in her meeting with President Ronald Reagan at Cancun in 1981, she signalled the Indian desire to adopt a truly non-aligned posture. A month after her assassination, India and the US signed the Gandhi-Reagan Science and Technology Initiative.
The Americans did not want to upset their Pakistani allies, so they did not position themselves as Soviet rivals. So, they came across as a country willing to back Indian S&T endeavours that would lead to the growth of domestic military and civil industry. In 1987, for example, they approved the use of the GE-404 jet engine for India’s Light Combat Aircraft project.
Grievously wounded by their Afghan war and an economy that was failing, the Soviets redoubled their efforts to keep India on their side. They now offered a range of their latest weapons and systems—MiG-29 fighters, T-72 tanks, Infantry Combat Vehicles, Kilo class submarines, Kashin II (Rajput)-class destroyers and so on. And all these at so-called friendship prices which simply could not be matched by any other power. In the 1980s, the Indian military re-equipped itself and became a formidable force, though its effectiveness was blunted by the outbreak of a terrorist movement in Punjab and an insurgency in Jammu & Kashmir. But it did manage to persuade China to talk peace on the LAC and the two countries signed agreements to maintain peace and tranquillity between them.