Foreign relations of India
India's relations with the world have evolved since the British Raj (1857–1947), when the British Empire monopolised external and defence relations. When India gained independence in 1947, few Indians had experience in making or conducting foreign policy. However, the country's oldest political party, the Indian National Congress, had established a small foreign department in 1925 to make overseas contacts and to publicise its independence struggle. From the late 1920s on, Jawaharlal Nehru, who had a long-standing interest in world affairs among independence leaders, formulated the Congress stance on international issues. As a member of the interim government in 1946, Nehru articulated India's approach to the world.
20th-century events
In India, Mahatma Gandhi became a global icon for his non-violent struggle to achieve Indian independence. This was achieved in 1947 with the end of British rule in India and the partition of the territory into modern day India and Pakistan, which would later also further divide, leading to the creation of the People's Republic of Bangladesh in 1971. Elsewhere in Asia, The United States granted independence to the Philippines, its major Pacific possession in 1946. In French Indochina, armed insurrections forced the French out in the early 1950s, leading to the formation of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.