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A subsidiary alliance is an alliance between a dominant nation and a nation that it dominates.

The doctrine of subsidiary alliance was introduced by Lord Richard Wellesley, British governor-general of India from 1798 to 1805. In the beginning of his governorship Wellesly adopted a policy of non-intervention but later he adopted the policy of subsidiary alliance.

Under this doctrine, the British Indian rulers were forced to come under British protection by suspending their native armies, maintaining British troops within their states and surrendering their foreign affairs to the British. In return the company would protect them from the attacks of their rival native rulers. By the late 18th century powerful emperors disappeared from the face of the Indian subcontinent and it was left with numerous weaker smaller states. Many rulers fell for this offer of protection by Lord Wellesley. It would spare them the trouble of maintaining an army and free them from the fear of losing their kingdom to other native rulers.

The Nizam of Hyderabad was the first to enter into this alliance. Tipu Sultan of Mysore refused to accept it but after the British victory in the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War, Mysore was forced to become a subsidiary ally. Later the Maratha ruler Baji Rao II also accepted subsidiary aliance in the Treaty of Bassein.

• George Bruce Malleson: An Historical Sketch of the Native States of India in Subsidiary Alliance with the British Government, Longmans, Green, and co., 1875, ISBN 1402184514
• Edward Ingram: Empire-Building and Empire-Builders: twelve studies, Routledge, 1995, ISBN 0714646121