“We need to remain alive to the challenges of managing” the relationship, the envoy says in Wharton speech.
AB Wire
PHILADELPHIA: As India unveils an “ambitious and transformative economic program,” with initiatives such as smart cities, “Make in India,” and “Digital India,” the country sees the United States as “an indispensible partner,” Indian Ambassador to the United States Arun K. Singh said.
Addressing the 20th Wharton India Economic Forum at the historic Union League of Philadelphia here on March 26, the ambassador said, by investing in India’s rise, the United States has, on its part, “pledged its friendship to a country where 800 million youth under the age of 35 years are impatient for change and eager to achieve it.”
At the outset, Singh outlined three “fundamental attributes” the two countries have in common, which according to him, have made the relationship “worthy of mutual investment”: the “multicultural and pluralistic” nature of the two societies; the two countries’ commitment to “strategic autonomy,” and the “the energy of our peoples.”
Elaborating on the two nations’ strong adherence to “strategic autonomy,” the ambassador pointed out that, in its early days as a nation, the United States “sought to avoid ‘entangling alliances’, resisting the temptation to take the easy way of aligning with the strong power of the day.” Even today, that tradition “of taking decisions in its own interest is widely emphasized,” he said.
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Similarly, Singh said, “the choice of ‘non-alignment’ during the Cold War” was “necessary to preserve the autonomy of our decision-making.” He added that “post cold-war, we have consciously sought to deepen our relations with all the major poles in the world, to enhance the space for the strategic autonomy of our decision making.”
The ambassador said “the energy of our peoples” is another common feature that binds the two countries. “The U.S. has maintained its competitive and creative edge for successive generations,” he said. “India is still at early stages, but is now the world’s fastest growing economy, and recognized the world over for cost effect R&D, and new dynamism in innovation and start-ups.”
Tracing the trajectory of the relationship over the decades since India’s independence, the ambassador described the first half a century of the ties as “one of uneasy intersection between the U.S. pursuit of its global security interests” and “India striving to consolidate its hard won independence by putting premium on political sovereignty and rapid economic development.”
The profound changes that occurred in the past two decades “slowly but surely” brought immediate interests of the two nations “more in alignment and in line with our long-term commitment to shared values,” he said.
Singh said a series of landmark events resulted in the transformation of the relations, beginning with the Kargil conflict in 1999, which according to him “provided an opportunity for the Clinton Administration to begin a course correction.”
He said the civil nuclear deal negotiated during the Bush “saw a new beginning” leading to more cooperation in defense, space and high technology. “The Obama Administration has consolidated those shifts and embraced India as a global player and a like-minded nation, whether to safeguard maritime security or to address climate change or to promote global health,” he said. “Mutual perceptions adjusted too, of India as a responsible power and of the US as one resident in Asia Pacific.”
Singh said today the countries are cooperating on a vast spectrum of areas such as defense, counter-terrorism, climate change, healthcare and education.
The ambassador also pointed out that the United States “has emerged as India’s largest trading partner in goods and services, with a total trade volume of $120 billion—rising five-fold in 15 years” and US investment in India has “jumped from less than $8 billion in 2004 to $28 billion today.”
Singh said the relationship should be nurtured continuously and with sensitivity. “Going forward, it is certain that India and the U.S. will look at each other with greater degree of understanding than in the past,” he said. “However, we need to remain alive to the challenges of managing an expanding relationship without sufficient past history of deep engagement,” he said.
The ambassador concluded: “Problems and differences will inevitably arise from time to time. They will need to be addressed and managed keeping in mind mutual interests and a longer term framework.”