Playing It Again With Sam

India should retain its good relations with the US in the Trump era, but expand its options with other key players.

- Pranay Sharma

ACCUSING a strategic partner of being a “free-loader” weeks before a crucial summit could hardly be described as the right opening notes to sustain an enduring relationship. Hence, despite the Indian establishment playing down US President Donald Trump’s recent outburst against India vis-a-vis the US’ exit from the Paris climate agreement as an ‘aberration’, questions are being raised on how Indo-US ties could progress under a Trump presidency.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to travel to Washington DC later this month for a much-hyped bilateral summit with Trump—their first meeting ever.

Predictably, in India, the forthcoming summit has generated much hope and expectation, given the trajectory of high growth in India-US relations in the past decade or so. Trump’s charge, therefore, that countries like India forced “billions and billions” of dollars from the US to be committed to the Climate Change Agreement, came as a major shock to Indian policy planners who were hoping for opening another sparkling chapter in ties.

Since January, Trump has shown consistency only in making off-the-cuff remarks, many of them directed against close US allies. Though he has, on occasion, also been amenable to a quick course correction—as he did with China, when he quickly did a volte face after questioning the validity of the “oneChina policy” in Sino-American relations. Many in India hope for a similar, hairpin bend in strategy vis-a-vis India.

Though foreign minister Sushma Swaraj politely refuted Trump’s false charges and reposed faith in strong India-US ties, many others in the government are concerned. “We have to accept the way he is and live with it,” says a BJP leader involved in Modi’s trip to the US.