Abstract
India’s relations with its neighbours in the maritime domain have received less scholarly attention. Those studies that deal with India’s relations with its South Asian neighbours generally touch on political security, socio-cultural and economic issues. The maritime aspect is either ignored or tucked in as a part of other dimensions. The present study attempts to fill the gap in the literature by taking up the case of Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka is chosen as a case, not only because the island state is India’s closest maritime neighbour but also due to the existence of deep interactions between the two countries in diverse fields both at governmental and non-governmental levels. In the maritime domain, in the present context, technically speaking, there is no problem between the two countries. However, the fishermen issue remains one of the issues principally because of the Tamil Nadu factor. Analysing the issue in five phases, the study argues for a ‘comprehensive approach’ for its settlement.