Modi plans September trip to fit Obama's schedule
The Modi-Obama meeting will take place on the margins of the inaugural day of the UN General Assembly, on September 28.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will not only fly half-way across the world later in September because he wants to meet US president Barack Obama, but has also agreed to fly back and forth across the US so that his schedule can suit that of the US president, highly-placed official sources have said.
The prime minister's evident eagerness to meet the outgoing US president is clear from fact that the day after he addresses the UN's major sustainable development summit in New York on September 25 - where 150 leaders from across the world are gathering to pursue commitments towards the eradication of poverty - he will fly across the US to the West Coast city of San Francisco for two days to grandstand in front of the Indian diaspora as well as meet with top leaders from Silicon Valley.
Almost immediately, Modi will jump back into Air India One and fly back to New York on the US East coast - a distance of 4100 km - so he is in time to meet Barack Obama on September 28. Officials in the ministry of external affairs are working extensively on the agenda for Modi's big meeting with Obama - certainly, climate change is a big issue, with Obama promising to cut down on emissions, and hoping that India and China will follow suit. Even though he is the outgoing president, which means that he carries less and less weight as each day passes, Obama remains one of the most powerful leaders in the world and Delhi knows that.
The reasons why Modi is so eager to meet Obama are also well-known, in the rarefied circles of both Delhi and Washington DC. Obama makes Modi feel like an equal, it is said, a testimony to the fact that it was the US president's heavy lifting that lifted the nearly decade-long ban on Modi visiting the US. The Modi-Obama meeting will take place on the margins of the inaugural day of the UN General Assembly (UNGA), on September 28.
Traditionally, the US president speaks on the first day of the UNGA. He packs the remains of the day with meeting some of the several score heads of state and government who fly into New York to attend the UNGA, and this time this includes the prime minister. But Modi isn't staying back to address the UNGA, as India has been slotted to speak on October 1. He will leave it to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to do so.
Back home, the biggest litmust test of his prime ministership waits - the Bihar elections, slated for early October - and he certainly wants to get back as quickly as possible. That is also the main reason why it is unlikely that Modi will stay on in New York to meet his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif, who is slotted to speak at the UN on September 30. Government officials may argue that they will wait to see the outcome of the meeting between the national security advisors of India and Pakistan on August 24, but the Bihar elections tilts the balance any day in the week.
As for Swaraj, she certainly hopes a magic wand will rescue her from her near-total marginalisation in the BJP's charmed circle these days. Perhaps the India-US strategic dialogue, which she will lead on September 21 in Washington DC - to be followed the day after by the bilateral commercial dialogue, to be led by Minister of State for Commerce Nirmala Sitharaman - is one way to do so. In fact, Swaraj may be able to impress Modi with her diligence if she can pull off a successful dialogue with US secretary of state John Kerry. A host of issues are on the agenda, from China and Pakistan to intellectual property rights disputes as well as other trade disputes. But despite the obvious Modi-Obama warmth, the truth is that the Indo-US relationship is stagnating.
As the shine wears off from his government and Modi comes to terms with the fact that hubris is not an alternative to reaching out to the Opposition, the first signs are that he is beginning to falter on India's most important relationship, the US. The main reason is that Modi doesn't trust anyone enough to carry out policy changes - certainly not Sushma Swaraj. And since he cannot be everywhere at the same time, the prime minister has been forced to give mixed signals both to his domestic as well as foreign audience. If the BJP loses Bihar, of course everything will change - in that situation, the Indo-US relationship and every other foreign relationship will perforce take a back seat for some time to come.