Thaindian News

By Arun Kumar
Washington, June 3 (IANS) India and the US hope to set new milestones as they hold their first strategic dialogue here Thursday to transform their growing relationship into a global strategic partnership encompassing a broad range from political to economic to social ties.

“We are expecting a very positive outcome from the talks. There are very positive vibrations,” External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna told IANS ahead of the dialogue he leads with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

India was not looking for short term deliverables from the talks, but a broad ranging partnership between the world’s two largest democracies to meet the challenges of the 21st century, he said.

The high-powered Indian delegation includes Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia and Minister of State for Science and Technology Prithviraj Chavan.

In a rare gesture, President Barack Obama, who has called the US-Indian relationship “one of the defining partnerships of the 21st century”, plans to attend a reception for Krishna at the State Department after the dialogue to discount perceptions that he is not as warm towards India as his predecessor George Bush.

Krishna’s comments came after Wednesday’s foreign policy dialogue between Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao and US Under Secretary of State William Burns to set the tone for Thursday’s ministerial level talks.

Indian Ambassador to the US Meera Shankar, Joint Secretary (Americas) Gayatri Kumar, US Ambassador to India Timothy Roemer and Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Robert Blake also joined the intensive dialogue.

Addressing the 35th anniversary summit meeting of the US-India Business Council (USIBC), Krishna said: “We will discuss many areas in which we have shared interests, ranging from countering terrorism and extremism, advancing nuclear security, working to secure the global commons, seeking to build a developed and cooperative Asia and succeeding in Afghanistan.”

The two countries will hold dialogues for co-operation in science and technology, research for clean energy and monsoon prediction, health and education and on women’s empowerment, he told the business promotion body representing some 300 US companies investing in India.

“That will be an important occasion for us to reflect on the remarkable journey that our two great democracies have embarked upon, and to set our sights on new milestones,” said Krishna.

“Tomorrow (Thursday) will be a significant day as we have intensive, wide-ranging discussions with a broad range of cabinet officials and a large Indian delegation,” State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters Wednesday.

As part of the dialogue, Sibal met Clinton Wednesday. They discussed India-US cooperation in higher education and increasing people-to-people ties, Crowley said, noting “education is a key component of our partnership with India, a key to meeting the demands of the 21st century economy”.

Other top officials of the two countries also held a series of brainstorming sessions here during which they discussed bilateral ties and issues like counter-terrorism, education, agriculture, trade and climate change to set the stage for Thursday’s dialogue.

Excellent progress was made in all of these meetings, said an official expressing confidence that the dialogue would prepare the ground for taking India-US relationship to the next level as being visualised by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Obama.

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)