Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: “Landed in Washington DC. Over the next two days, will be meeting @POTUS @JoeBiden and @VP @KamalaHarris, Prime Ministers @ScottMorrisonMP, and @sugawitter. Will attend the Quad meeting and would also interact with leading CEOs to highlight economic opportunities in India,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who reached the US late on Wednesday on his seventh visit since assuming office in 2014, tweeted.
He was received at the airport by senior officials of the Biden Administration and India’s Ambassador to the US, Taranjit Singh Sandhu.
Modi’s four-day official visit to the US has a packed agenda over the next three days. It includes his first in-person meeting with President Joe Biden and his deputy Kamala Harris, attend the first in-person Summit of the leaders of Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) and address the 76th session of the UN General Assembly in New York.
The PM said his visit would be an occasion to strengthen the Indo-US Comprehensive Global Strategic Partnership and consolidate ties with Japan and Australia.
“Namaste USA! PM @narendramodi was greeted on arrival by Shri Taranjit Singh Sandhu, Ambassador of India to the USA, and Mr. T. H. Brian McKeon, US Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources,” Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Arindam Bagchi tweeted in New Delhi.
Despite heavy rains since early Wednesday morning, several Indian-Americans welcomed Modi at the Andrews Joint Airforce Base.
“Exuberant members of the Indian diaspora welcoming PM @narendramodi upon landing in Washington D.C,” Bagchi tweeted along with pictures of Modi interacting with Indian-Americans.
US President Biden will host the Indian PM at the White House in their first bilateral meeting on September 24. Later that day, Biden will host the first-ever in-person Quad Leaders’ Summit with Modi, and Prime Ministers Yoshihide Suga of Japan, and Scott Morrison of Australia.
After Biden took oath as the US President, he has spoken with Modi several times, the last being on April 26.
Vice-President Harris, the first woman, Black American and the first South Asian to be elected to the second most important office in the US, will meet PM Modi on September 23 for their maiden meeting. She had earlier spoken with him over the phone in June during the crisis of the second wave of Covid-19.
“During my visit, I will review the India-US Comprehensive Global Strategic Partnership with President Biden and exchange views on regional and global issues of mutual interest,” Modi had said just before leaving for the US.
“I am also looking forward to meeting Vice-President Kamala Harris to explore opportunities for cooperation between our two nations particularly in the area of science and technology,” said Modi, who is visiting the US at the invitation of President Biden.
The Quad Summit, he said, provides an opportunity to take stock of the outcomes of the four leaders’ Virtual Summit in March this year and identify priorities for future engagements based on our shared vision for the Indo-Pacific region.
Besides meeting Biden and Harris, PM Modi will also hold bilateral meetings with Morrison and Suga to take stock of the strong bilateral relations. “My visit to the US would be an occasion to strengthen the Comprehensive Global Strategic Partnership with the USA, consolidate relations with our strategic partners – Japan and Australia – and to take forward our collaboration on important global issues,” he had said in his departure statement.
He will conclude the visit with an address at the 76th Session of the UN General Assembly on Saturday, focusing on the pressing global challenges including the Covid-19 pandemic, the need to combat terrorism, climate change, and other important issues.
On Tuesday, Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla had said in New Delhi that the developments in Afghanistan will be extensively discussed in the bilateral talks between Modi and Biden and India will urge Washington to continue to focus on that country, which the Taliban recaptured on August 15.
Besides, the PM will also hold one-on-one meetings with five top executives from the US, including Cristiano E Amon (Qualcomm), Shantanu Narayen (Adobe), Mark Widmar (First Solar), Vivek Lall (General Atomics), and Stephen A Schwarzman (Blackstone).
Unlike his earlier six visits, this time his US tour has been kept a simple affair due to the Covid-19 restrictions. Earlier, his visits were marked with signature massive meetings with the Indian-American community, in particular, the one at the Madison Square Garden in 2015, and thereafter in the Silicon Valley, and the last one was Houston in 2019. . No large event for the PM has been planned this time.