India has faced a number of democracy related crisis situations in the neighbouring countries since its greater and declared commitment to the cause of democracy at the global level. India's memberships of the Community of Democracies (2000) and the UN Democracy Fund (2005), have been noted in the first chapter. The Maoist insurgency gained momentum in Nepal during the late 1990s and reached explosive dimensions in 2001. The spill-over of this insurgency were generally being ignored, until 9/11. But India was dragged into the growing Maoist insurgency as a result of growing fear about increasing linkages between the Nepal Maoists and the Indian Naxalites. The spill-over of insurgency in Nepal became extremely difficult for India to handle particularly after King's Gyanendra's direct take-over in 2005 and the emergence of ‘people's uprising’, Jan Andolan II, in 2006. After 9/11 and the launching of the ‘operation enduring freedom’ by the US in Afghanistan which subsequently got enlarged into the ‘global war on terror’, Afghanistan's democratic reconstruction was initiated. India has been a party to this process from day one without joining militarily the ‘alliance of the willing’ to fight the ‘war on terror’ (WOT).

In Bangladesh, the normal democratic process was disrupted in 2006 and from January 2007, new efforts were made to restore democratic order on more sustainable and constructive basis. Maldives and Bhutan initiated their top down democratic processes in 2004 and Pakistan has undergone a political transition to restore democratic rule and civilian governance by containing military's role in politics.