'From vital energy anchor to constrained secondary partner'

With Iran, India is executing a sharp commercial decoupling while maintaining a calculated diplomatic presence, says Ausaf Sayeed, former envoy to Saudi, Yemen

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former Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs with 34 years of service, Dr Ausaf Sayeed isa leading expert on Persian Gulf and the Arab world. He has served as India’s Ambassador to Saudi Arabia and Yemen and also held diplomatic postings in Egypt and Qatar, among other countries. He speaks to Jayanth Jacob about the protests in Iran and the evolving India-Iran relationship. Excerpts:

Is the current wave of protests in Iran qualitatively different from previous uprisings in terms of geographic spread, social composition and durability, or does it follow familiar patterns seen in 2009, 2017-18 and 2022?

The 2025-2026 protests mark a definitive qualitative rupture rather than a repetition of 2009, 2017-18, or 2022. Geographically, the uprising has engulfed over 180 cities across all 31 provinces, collapsing the centre-periphery divide that previously allowed the state to contain unrest.

Socially, it features an unprecedented coalition: historically conservative Bazaari merchants have joined workers, students, and marginalised border communities, transforming fragmented grievances into a unified national front. Politically, demands have shifted from reform to explicit regime change, rejecting the Islamic Republic’s ideological foundations entirely.

This evolution is underscored by the deadliest repression since 1979-with confirmed deaths exceeding 3,000-signalling an irreversible, generational loss of faith in the system’s legitimacy.

Do these protests signal a crisis of governance or a crisis of legitimacy, and which of the two poses a more serious long-term challenge to Iran?