Washington DC
In recent years, there have been close and frequent contacts at political
and official levels. There is now a wide-ranging dialogue on global, regional and
bilateral issues of mutual interest between the two countries.
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November 24, which was also attended by Minister for External Affairs Shri
S.M.Krishna and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Prime Minister and the
US President reviewed all aspects of the India-US bilateral relationship
including the progress of the Strategic Dialogue that was announced during the
visit of Mrs.Clinton to India on July 20, 2009. Prime Minister conveyed to the
President that the rapid socio-economic transformation underway in India
holds several opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation between the two
countries and that India is in a position to contribute to global economic
recovery, combat poverty and underdevelopment, and provide stability to a
region plagued by terrorism and violent extremism. Eight MOU/MOIs were
signed between the two sides during the visit.
Prime Minister had met President Obama for the first time in London in
April 2009 on the sidelines of G-20 Summit. He met the President again in
L’Aquila in Italy and also during the G-20 Summit in Pittsburg, USA in
September 2009. Earlier, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited India in July
2009 and had launched a new Strategic Dialogue with EAM.
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Both the leaders reaffirmed their intention to move ahead and
operationalize the provisions of the Civil Nuclear Agreement at the earliest and
also agreed to consult regularly and seek the early start of negotiations on a
multilateral, non-discriminatory and internationally verifiable Fissile Material
Cutoff Treaty at the Conference on Disarmament. They further committed
themselves to strengthen and reform the global economic and financial
architecture in the G-20, World Bank and the IMF, and to achieving genuine
reform of the United Nations including in its Security Council in a manner that
reflects the contemporary realities of the 21st century.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited India from 17-21 July, 2009. This
was the first high-level political contact between India and the US since the
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formation of the new Government in Delhi. Earlier, in her speech at the 34th
anniversary of the USIBC on 17th June in New York, Secretary Clinton spelt out
her vision for the next phase of the India-US relations. She mentioned that the
US saw “India as one of the few key partners worldwide who will help us shape
the 21st century.” She has termed the next phase as being the “third era of the
US-India relations” which would have four platforms of cooperation –global
security, human development, economic activity and science and technology.”
There were other high level visits during this year, including NSA,
Commerce & Industry Minister, Human Resource Development Minister,
Minister for Environment and Forests, Minister for Non-Conventional &
Renewable Energy, FS and SEPM. From the US side, apart from Secretary
Clinton, NSA General James Jones, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Deputy
Secretary of Defence William Lynn have visited India.
The growing economic partnership between the US and India has been
one of the pillars of the transformed bilateral relationship. In the Joint
Statement issued on November 24, 2009, during Prime Minister’s state visit to
Washington, Prime Minister and President Obama agreed to launch the India–
US Financial and Economic Partnership to strengthen bilateral engagement on
macro-economic, financial, and investment-related issues.
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The ‘New Framework for India-US Defence Relationship’ signed between the
two sides on June 28, 2005 and the India-US ‘Framework for Maritime Security
Cooperation’ signed in March 2006 have added a new dynamism to the Indo-US
defence ties. Under the Framework for Defence Cooperation, six Joint Working
Groups are functioning.
Joint Exercises between the three Services of both countries have improved
in scale and frequency since the signing of the New Framework. From the US,
India has presently contracted for defence equipments such as radars,
maritime patrol aircraft, transport aircraft, anti ship missiles etc.
The present Defense Secretary Robert Gates visited India from February
26-27, 2008 and our Raksha Mantri Shri A.K.Antony visited Washington from
September 7-10, 2008. Admiral Timothy Keating, Commander, US Pacific
Command visited India during 13-15 May 2009. The new PACOM Commander
Admiral Willard visited India in early December 2009. CoAS visited Washington
in July 2009.
The U.S. – India Joint Working Group on Civil Space Cooperation is the
forum for discussions on joint activities in space. India signed a landmark
agreement with NASA at their Ames Research Centre on 28th July 2008 to
carry out lunar exploration. India's first unmanned lunar mission,
Chandrayaan-I was successfully launched from Shriharikota on 22nd October,
2008 and carried two NASA payloads - a Miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar to
map ice deposits in the moon's surface and a Moon Mineralogy Maper to assess
mineral resources of the Moon. A Technology Safeguards Agreement (TSA)
signed with the US on July 20, 2009 in New Delhi during the visit of US
Secretary of State, will open up fresh opportunities for India in the field of space
launches and will facilitate the launch of non-commercial US satellites and
satellites with US components on Indian launch vehicles. US has subsequently
approved launch of ALSAT-2A and 2B satellites by Polar Satellite Launch
Vehicle (PSLV).
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A Letter of Intent was signed between ISRO and NASA on November 18,
2009, on Oceansat-2 collaboration, on the sidelines of the 6th Plenary session of
the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) in Washington. The Oceansat-2 was
successfully launched by ISRO from Sriharikota on September 23, 2009 using
PSLV. This would enable the US agencies to receive Oceansat-2 data for
research, education etc.
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India and the US signed a Science & Technology Agreement on October 17,
2005 that deals with IPR issues and provides for joint research and training,
and the establishment of public-private partnerships. A $30 million Science &
Technology Endowment for various related projects was established during the
visit of Secretary of State to India on 20 July 2009. The 11th annual governing
body meeting of the India-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF), was
held at National Institute of Health, Bethesda, USA during 7-8 December, 2009.
An MoU for “Earth Observations and Earth Sciences” has been signed between
Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) and US National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) in April, 2008 and the first Joint Executive Meeting
(JEM) was held during 6-7 October 2009 in New Delhi. The 6th Steering
Committee Meeting of Methane to Markets (M2M) partnership was held at
Washington DC during 10-11 September 2009 and was represented by India. A
delegation from India attended the XXXII Antartica Treaty Consultative Meeting
and XII Committee for Environmental Protection meetings held in Baltimore,
USA, from 16-17 April, 2009.
During the visit of Secretary of State Clinton to India during July 2009, a
“Health Dialogue” was established between the two countries, which forms part
of the “Indo-US Strategic Dialogue.” US National Institute of Health (NIH) has
eight collaborative programmes with DBT, DST & Indian Council of Medical
Research (ICMR); NIH awarded over 100 research projects to India in 2008;
Indo-US Centre for Research on Indian System of Medicine (CRISM) established
at University of Mississippi, USA in April 2009; Teaching of basic courses on
Ayurveda in different U.S Medical Schools as Continued Medical Education
(CME) course by experts nominated by the Department of AYUSH, Ministry of
Health & Family Welfare, Government of India. The Dept.of Biotechnology in
collaboration with Indo-US S&T Forum and Stanford University has formulated
Stanford-India Bio-design program for development of implants and medical
devices. US Food & Drug Administration (USFDA) opened two offices in New
Delhi and Mumbai in January 2009.
January 2010