The Modi Government is only a few months old. It is too much to expect that many of the outstanding issues between India and the US can be resolved by a new Government in such a small time
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US was a packed one and extensively covered by the Indian media. Although the rationale for this official visit was (i) to address the 69th Annual General Assembly opening and (ii) bilateral talks with the US President, he had a range of engagements, including conversations with eminent persons ranging from Nobel laureates to prominent US political leaders along with major public appearances at large gatherings in New York.
Prime Minister’s US visit was the culmination on a blitzkrieg of his meetings with major global political leaders starting from regional leaders to heads of the government of Japan, China and Australia. It is probably the most expansive attempt, in a long time, for any newly elected Indian leader to engage in such an intense engagement with foreign leaders, which did result in some commentaries about the wisdom of intense foreign engagements especially after the somewhat disappointing deliberations with the Japanese and Chinese leadership. Nevertheless Mr Modi has an unique style of his own and the results of his US visit has to be on its own merits and not on style alone.
How does one evaluate his US visitIJ It was spread over five days with engagements in two major US cities — New York and Washington DC.
While the primary purpose of his visit to New York was to address the UN General Assembly, it was his appearances at two major public events — the gala function in Madison Square Garden and at the Global Citizen Festival in Central Square — that attracted the most attention.
This is not surprising, given that the opening of the annual UN General Assembly sessions are rather a dull affair — again not surprising given that more than 200 world leaders give their speeches at the opening session — spread over five-six days. Nearly all these speeches have relevance and public exposure only in the country of the leader. So it is not surprising, and at par with the earlier such speeches by Indian leaders, which have extensive coverage in India with very little coverage in other countries’ media including the US, Mr Modi’s UN speech too was covered extensively in India with little coverage elsewhere. His UN speech was noticeable for two reasons: one, his plea to the UN General Assembly to adopt an International Yoga day and for the length of his speech. With more than 200 speeches spread over a period of six days, time is at a premium and most leaders limit themselves to an average of 20-25 minutes or less. Mr Modi’s speech was the second longest, of nearly 35 minutes, exceeded only by President Obama’s speech, which lasted for 40 minutes.
The PM did utilise his presence at the UN to meet leaders of three of India’s neighbours — the President of Sri lanka, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh and the Prime Minister of Nepal — to discuss bilateral issues.
However, his other engagements in New York were a resounding success. His breakfast meeting with nearly a dozen US CEOs was well received. Mr Modi’s primary objective in this meeting was to convince the CEOs about the strength of Indian economy and the goals of his administration to improve the business climate. He seems to have been successful in convincing the CEO about the sincerity of his Government. How this translates into actual investment only time will tell, although the first impressions are favourable.
His more than an hour speech/conversation/Q&A at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) was probably one of the longest that Mr Modi had with political analysts anywhere on matters touching domestic and international politics. Once again his audience was impressed with his performance given the fact they were all suitably awed by his impressive credential — an impressive electoral victory in India being the first party leader to win absolute majority in Parliament in more than thirty years with more than 550 million voters participating in the elections. It was not so much as what was said — it had been said by him many times earlier — but the manner of his interaction that impressed his audience at CFR.
The other public appearances in New York were pure PR exercises — albeit a very successful one especially among the NRIs in the US. Indeed his Madison Square Garden appearance was a topic of the very popular TV late night show John Oliver’s “last week tonight”. With a crowd of estimated 20,000 people all rooting for Mr Modi, as CFR President Mr Haas remarked during his introduction, “Madison Square Garden has not seen such excitement since Knicks won a championship, which was so long ago that few who are witness are still with us today”. There is no doubt that Mr Modi’s popularity among NRIs in the US far outstrips that of any other Indian and his New York outings only consolidated his grip in their loyalty to him. For his part, Mr Modi announced some gifts for the NRIs principally by promising to merge PIO and OCI cards with lifetime visas for such cardholders in addition to removing the requirement of regular reporting to a police station. While the crown in Madison Square Garden was almost wholly that of NRIs, the large crowd at the Global Citizen Festival in Central Park, much larger with nearly 60,000 people — mostly American students and youth. The annual event — more of a music festival with strong social message — is attended by well known public figures. This year although other personalities like UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and World Bank President Jim Yong Kim too attended the event, Mr Modi stole the show.
After three days in New York, Mr Modi then travelled to Washington DC for the other major political purpose of his US visit, for his meeting with President Obama and the bilateral India-US talks. While PM Modi had a number of public engagements in New York, in Washington he was primarily engaged in talks with the US Administration both bilaterally with President Obama and collectively between the Indian and US delegations.
Prime Minister Modi had two scheduled visits to the White House on back-to-back days, first on Monday evening for dinner with President Obama and then on Tuesday for talks. At the private dinner on Monday with only a few others present. On Tuesday, the two leaders first had a private talk in a restrictive format and later at a delegation level. The two leaders held a joint Press Briefing after their meeting.
How does one judge the outcome of his talks with President ObamaIJ
The results of his talks with President Obama are primarily (i) the Vision Statement issued by the two leaders at the end of their private dinner on Monday, (ii) Their Joint Press Conference after their meeting on Tuesday, (iii) their Joint editorial in the Washington Post on Tuesday and (iv) the Joint Statement issued by the two leaders at the end of the visit.
There are two points to analyse. The first is the outcome on the basis of the public statements and two, the body language of the two leaders during their joint appearances.
Taking the latter point first, all visuals suggest that the two leaders appeared comfortable with each other even though this was their first face-to-face meeting. In addition to the formal meetings, President Obama personally escorted Prime Minister Obama at the Martin luther King Jr. memorial. However, one additional factors needs to be considered. Although the two leaders do not seem to have even referred to either the denial of visa to PM Modi or the events leading up to the denial decision, it may not mean that the President may not share some apprehensions about the ideology of the Modi Government. It is quite likely that the President may be perturbed by Mr Modi’s total silence on the activities of some his colleagues, who seem to subscribe to a “separate but equal” ideology in their dealings with minorities in India. The “Separate but equal” was a legal doctrine in United States constitutional law that justified and permitted racial segregation which was overturned by the US Supreme Court’s two decisions in 1954 in the Brown vs Board of Education case. Given President Obama’s legal background and active participation in civil rights issues, some of the recent developments in India after the formation of the Modi Government and the pronouncements of some of its political leaders (it must be stressed that Mr Modi has been extremely fair in his pronouncements of the subject) and Mr Modi’s total and absolute silence on these developments would undoubtedly have given rise some unease in President Obama’s mind even though the matter would not have been raised during his talks with Mr Modi.
With this background how does one analyse the outcome of the talks by way of takeaways on both sides. Objectively speaking the takeaways, not part of earlier takeaways, were minimal. For instance the offer of membership to ‘Global Entry’ Trusted Traveller Network Programme was made a year back during PM Manmohan Singh’s visit to the US in September 2013. Same with the US Task Force on hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs). In 2013, the Joint statement referred to the “immediate convening” up of the task force. This year it is a pledge to “urgently arrange a meeting of their bilateral task force on HFC”. All this should not be either surprising or lead one to feel that the visit was a failure.
The Modi Government is only a few months in office, and it is too much to expect that many, or even a few, of the outstanding issues that have been under discussion by both sides for years could be resolved by a new Government in such a small time. Second, many of the takeaways that would make the US happy are not the sort of matters that could be either resolved or announced by the India PM in a foreign country, especially in a democracy with a very vocal Parliament. So it is not surprising that the nuclear commerce issue still remains unresolved with only a very proforma statement that they will establish a Contact Group on advancing the implementation of civil nuclear energy cooperation. The resolutions of the bilateral differences require some fresh thinking on both sides. That is sadly lacking today on both sides. The Indian bureaucracy is (i) already overloaded and (ii) and reluctant to suggest fresh solutions. On the US side, there does not seem to be the same degree of high-level commitment to India-US relations as existed during the Bush administration and there is also some doubt about India’s commitments. Thus, for instance, PM Manmohan Singh promised President Obama that India will ratify CSC (Convention on Supplementary Compensation) by 2011 end. Even after three years, it is yet to be done.
Therefore, while there is no reason why India-US relations should not follow the trajectory envisaged by the two leaders, it is doubtful if that will be realised unless some drastic changes are made on both sides on their decision-making architecture. It will be very difficult for Mr Modi — no matter his hands-on leadership approach — to devote his time to nuclear, defence, trade, commerce, finance issues. All these will only add to the woes of those drafting future joint statements.
(The writer is Consulting Fellow, IDSA, New Delhi)