During a hurried tour of around 55 hours, Prime Minister Narendra Modi accomplished “very significant outcomes” in bilateral and multilateral domains and India was able to voice its opinions on a global platform, according to India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri.
“I’m sure the results from this will stand us in good strength as we move forward,” Misri said briefing reporters on Prime Minister Modi’s visit that included meetings with US President Joe Biden and other leaders, participation in the Quad and United Nations summits, and speaking at a rally of the diaspora.
Though his remarks were succinct, he stated, “We’ve had very significant outcomes in the bilateral, unilateral, and multilateral domains.” It’s “enabled India to say its piece and share its thoughts on a global stage” .
According to him, there was “a very strong technology element” to the visit, which included the roundtable of tech CEOs, the Quad’s joint declaration, the US-India bilateral brief, and other settings with Prime Minister Modi.
The tech CEOs roundtable felt that India’s belief that “technology can be a driver of seminal change for the nation, but also for countries of the global south in general, which should not be left behind in this race for technology” is particularly relevant at this time when innovations like AI and quantum computing are reshaping the world as we know it. “They felt that India could play a leadership role in this regard,” he stated.
He stated that India had “shown a third way to the world of how digital prowess could be leveraged for social and public good, not just in one country, but in a scalable manner to the rest of the world” with the concept of the digital public infrastructure (DPI), which enables a payments, identity, and documentation system.
“It also gave the opportunity to reflect on how technology has become a core driver of the India-US strategic partnership,” he stated.
The discussion was attended by the CEOs of bioscience behemoths like Moderna and Biogen as well as prominent IT companies like Google, Nvidia, Global Foundry, and IBM.
President Biden and Prime Minister Modi decided to promote new AI innovation opportunities, improve R&D collaboration on advanced semiconductor processors, and boost funding for India’s National Quantum Mission, according to a joint information sheet provided by the White House.
“We are quite clear in so far as the big story here is concerned, which is the very important relationship between India and the United States, we intend to keep working on that,” Misri responded when asked about the impact on India-US relations of the reported meeting between Khalistani Sikhs and White House officials, as well as the cases filed by Khalistani leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun against the Indian government and some officials.
He dismissed any attempts to add irritants. “If you want details with regard to that and what the motivation of these things is, what the purpose is, and what ends this is supposed to serve, I think it would be better to direct this question to people who are directly involved in this.”
When the World Court ruled last week that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip was unconstitutional and demanded that it leave those areas, India refrained from voting on the resolution at the General Assembly.
Misri responded, “The Palestinian leader did explicitly state that he was very appreciative of India’s support, not just for humanitarian assistance, but also for India’s political support to Palestine on the international stage,” when asked if it had come up during Prime Minister Modi’s meeting with President Mahmoud Abbas of Palestine.
A Pact for the Future, which advocated for expediting the Security Council reform process, was endorsed by the Summit of the Future. It committed world leaders to an action plan to address the challenges confronting the UN and the world at large.
The fact that “for the first time, a UN summit document has a detailed paragraph on UN Security Council reform” was noteworthy, according to Misri.
“So it may not have every single detail in every area that we would imagine or we would like there to be, but I think it’s a good beginning, and we look forward eventually to the beginning of text-based negotiations in a fixed time frame going forward,” he said.
Read More
Quad is going to defend an open and free Indo-Pacific area