After Modi Met Trump

Thursday’s meeting between Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump will remain a topic for discussion across the globe for several weeks from now. Despite a slew of negative speculations made by the global anti-India lobby, there are a lot of takeaways from the meeting of the two leaders. Analysing the discussions and the reactions coming from different parts of the world, one must say that overall, both sides appear to be comfortably set to continue the collaborations that were started between India and the US when Joe Biden was the president. This is particularly true with collaborations in the field of defence and technology, though experts have pointed out that collaborations may undergo a rebranding under the new president. It is indeed very significant that New Delhi and Washington have agreed to work closely for catalysing opportunities for military partnership, accelerated commerce and technology—aptly called COMPACT in the joint statement—for the twenty-first century, one which is expected to drive transformative change across key areas of cooperation like defence, energy security technology and innovation, investment and trade, multilateral cooperation, and above all, people-to-people connection. Other key highlights of the Modi-Trump meeting, as mentioned in the joint statement, include a new ten-year framework for the US-India Major Defence Partnership in the 21st Century (which will be signed later this year), expanding defence sales and co-production with India to strengthen interoperability and defence industrial cooperation, opening negotiations within this year for a reciprocal defence procurement mechanism, and a review of International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) to streamline defence trade, exchange and maintenance of technology, supply of spares, and in-country repair and overhaul of defence systems to be provided by the US. Another key aspect is the new initiative called the Autonomous Systems Industry Alliance (ASIA), through which the two powers intend to scale up industry partnerships and production in the Indo-Pacific. ASIA refers to India-US cooperation in the area of underwater domain awareness technologies, with the US offering a few co-production and co-development opportunities for UDA technologies on a commercial basis. India incidentally has become the very first country with whom the US defence industry has offered to work on these sensitive technologies, and this will have a long-term impact on international strategic aspects, particularly in the Indo-Pacific, where the eyes of all global powers are currently more or less fixed. Looking beyond issues relating to US-India defence cooperation, one finds that on the economic front, the two leaders have set a new common goal for bilateral trade, aptly called Mission 500, through which they have aimed at more than doubling the total bilateral trade to $500 billion by 2030. The two leaders have also demonstrated mutual commitment to address bilateral trade barriers. Another big achievement for Modi—and India—is the recognition of Indian investments in the US. Indian companies have ongoing investments worth over $7.355 billion in the US at present, which have already provided 3,000 high-quality jobs for local families. Likewise, on the technology and innovation front, the two sides have announced the launch of a US-India TRUST (“Transforming the Relationship Utilising Strategic Technology”) initiative, which will help catalyse government-to-government, academia, and private sector collaboration to promote the application of critical and emerging technologies in areas like defence, artificial intelligence, semiconductors, quantum, biotechnology, energy, and space. Additionally, a US-India roadmap on accelerating SI Infrastructure has also been envisaged to be in place by the end of the year. This will enable the two sides to work together to enable industry partnerships and investments in next-generation data centres, cooperation on development, and access to computers and processors for AI. In the area of innovation, on the other hand, the two sides have announced the launch of INDUS Innovation, an innovation bridge modelled after the successful INDUS-X platform, which in turn will advance US-India industry and academic partnerships and foster investments in space, energy, and other emerging technologies. Then, there is also the agreement to expand Indian manufacturing capacity, including in the US, for active pharmaceutical ingredients for critical medicines, which will go a long way in tackling certain major health issues. The biggest gain for India’s new generation, however, is the recognition of the 300,000-strong Indian student community’s contribution of over $8 billion annually to the US economy, which has helped create a large number of jobs, both direct and indirect. Alongside comes the pledge to strengthen collaborations between higher education institutions through efforts such as joint/dual degree and twinning programs, establishing joint Centres of Excellence, and setting up offshore campuses of premier educational institutions of the US in India. As a corollary, there has come a joint commitment to streamline avenues for legal mobility of students and professionals and facilitate short-term tourist and business travel, while also aggressively addressing illegal immigration and human trafficking.