On the morning after Christmas 2004,the staggering death toll from the tsunami was still unkown, when a call from Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa to India envoy Nirupama Rao made it clear that island nation needed urgent humanitarian assistance. In Washington DC, India Ambassador Ronen Sen was also being asked by the US government how much India could help further afield , as the tsunami had wreaked havoc across the area now called Indo-Pacific. For India , said a senior official , it was time to show that the Indian Ocean was in fact India’s domain and India committed in an unprecedented manner to the effort. With in 12 hours helicopter were in Colombo with relief material.By the next days INS Khukri and INS Nirupak were converted into hospital ships.In all about 32 Indian ships and 5500 troops were involved in International relief effort.

 “India full capabilities came as surprise to the world” recall Foreign Secretary at the time who received a call from U.S Secretory saying the world could not wait, and it was up to the countries of the Indo-Pacific that had naval capabilities of scale to move in urgently. The US president announced that India, the U.S ,Japan and Australia would set up an international coalition to coordinate the massive effort required : to rescue those trapped in the waters, rush relief and rehabilitate .Later charge was handed to the UN and it led to new framework : the Quadrilateral .Japan’s PM was the first off the block ,voicing his long standing idea of an “arc of prosperity and freedom” that encompassed India and brought it into a tighter maritime framework ,with Japan, the US and Australia which were already close military allies.

But the idea born of such intense urgency as the tsunami met a lack-luster end after its meeting in May 2007.Contray to public perception , Australia wasn’t first to demur. The US felt that angering China with the Quadrilateral would hamper large strategic effort underway.

A decade later , the question is : will the Quadrilateral melt away as before or it an idea whose time has finally come.