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JAN. 23 2015 5:30 PM

Why Obama’s Visit to India Is Such a Big DealBy Joshua Keating

Get ’em while they’re hot! Kites printed with the portraits of Prime Minister Narendra Modiand U.S. President Barack Obama, on sale in Hyderabad on Jan. 7, 2015.

Photo by Noah Seelam/AFP/Getty Images

What a difference a year has made for the U.S. and India. In January 2014, U.S.diplomats were being expelled from New Delhi amid widespread public outrageover the treatment of an Indian diplomat in New York, marking the worst crisis inrelations between the two countries in years. Meanwhile, Narendra Modi, then-chiefminister of Gujarat and a candidate for prime minister, was still banned from enteringthe United States on suspicion of complicity in atrocities.

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Joshua Keating is a staff writer at Slate focusing on international affairs.

But this weekend, President Obama will head to India, becoming the first U.S.president ever to make two visits to the country while in office and the first Americanever invited to be “chief guest” at India’s annual Republic Day celebration. Thesymbolically important visit follows a productive and cordial couple of months in theoften fraught U.S.-India relationship since Modi’s election in May.

It’s surprising that a relationship that had frayed under former PrimeMinister Manmohan Singh—a mild-mannered, Western-educated economist—hasbeen repaired under Modi, known, at least until a pre-election centrist rebranding, asa hard-line Hindu nationalist. But close observers say Modi’s embrace of Obama wasinevitable, given his pledges to dramatically modernize and develop India’s economy.

“Modi is a supreme pragmatist,” says Sumit Ganguly, a professor of political science atIndiana University and expert on Indian foreign policy. “He wants to get certain thingsdone and recognizes the strategic importance of the United States. He may still harborsome personal animus, but he’s not going to let that get in the way of attracting moreinvestment from the United States or building a more robust security relationship.”

The big breakthrough came last May, when, after years of being denied a visa to visitthe U.S., Obama invited him to Washington. (Modi’s visa ban stems from the 2002Gujarat riots, in which more than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims, were killed.Modi, who was chief minister of the state at the time, was accused of failing to stopthe riots or even helping to provoke them with his rhetoric.) When Modi did finallycome to the U.S., he was rapturously received by a sellout crowd at Madison SquareGarden and met with the president at the White House. He was also met with proteststhroughout his visit, and some protocol watchers in the Indian media interpreted it asa snub that he was not invited to a state dinner.

JOSHUA KEATING

If Modi was insulted, he brushed it off, inviting Obama to sit with him at the RepublicDay parade just a few months after their last meeting. The invitation of a U.S.president “breaks a kind of symbolic taboo,” says Sadanand Dhume, a resident fellowat the American Enterprise Institute. “India, even though officially nonaligned, hastilted away from the U.S. for most of its independent history, even with the end of theCold War. Millions of people will watch this, and it’s sending a message.”

Dhume says the speed with which Obama has reciprocated Modi’s overtures hasbeen striking. In addition to the concrete issues the two leaders may discuss, forObama the trip is an opportunity to demonstrate that while the administration’splanned “pivot to Asia” has been somewhat derailed by attention-sucking events inthe Middle East, it can still make progress on important relationships.

The visit will also help Modi distinguish himself from the Indian National Congressparty, who ruled India for most of its independent history, promoting a foreign policyof nonalignment. Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party “isn’t necessarily pro-American,”Dhume says, “but it doesn’t have that baggage. They don’t have that much ideologyon foreign policy and don’t feel the need to demonstrate that India’s not turning into aU.S. vassal.”

The Congress Party also isn’t as reflexively anti-American as it once was, but “thoseinstincts haven’t gone away entirely,” says Dhume, “and in the last few months of theManmohan Singh government we started to see them creeping back a little.”

Those instincts were on full display during the scandal surrounding DevyaniKhobragade, a deputy consul general at the Indian consulate in New York who wasarrested on visa fraud charges for paying her nanny far less than the legal wage statedon her visa application. Khobrogade’s treatment—she was arrested by the NYPDwhile dropping off her daughter at school and strip-searched before being released onbail—was a national scandal in India, and the Congress Party government, thenheading into elections, played up the nationalist furor to maximum effect, removingsecurity barriers from outside the U.S. Embassy and threatening to remove thediplomatic immunity of American officials.

“One year ago today, that would have been the only thing anyone would talk about,”says Alyssa Ayres, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and a formerdeputy assistant secretary of state for South Asia, in a conference call with reporters.“It was a substantial rupture in the relationship for several months, and the normalkinds of bureaucratic meetings that happen between the two countries weren’t takingplace. That’s no longer the case. We’ve seen an uptick in conversation and diplomaticdialogue.”

Dhume says Modi’s political base is less receptive to appeals to anti-Americanism. “Inmany ways Modi’s constituency is the most naturally pro-U.S. constituency in India,”he says. “These are a lot of young people living in cities. They tend not to view the U.S.through an ideological lens.”

Ganguly also notes that Modi is “deeply beholden to the Indian business community,and particularly some very large conglomerates who supported him in the electionand constitute a very power constituency in his party. If he cannot woo the world’smost powerful economic partner, then he has a problem.”

This, then, raises the question of whether the Obama visit will result in any concreteannouncements or is just an enormously important photo op. One area where realmovement is possible is climate change. We’re unlikely to see anything as dramatic asthe U.S.-China emissions pact announced last year—India, which is still heavily relianton coal and considers itself well behind China in terms of economic development, hasbeen extremely reluctant to commit to capping its emissions. But Modi hasannounced ambitious solar energy plans, and the two leaders agreed to cooperateon promoting renewable energy during their White House meeting in September.There’s also been speculation that the visit could include an announcement of U.S.investment in India’s nuclear industry.

On trade, the U.S. and India already reached a breakthrough in November, and Modiwill be looking for the U.S. to make good on pledges to increase investment in thecountry.

Defense issues will no doubt be central to the talks. India has ordered more than $10billion in weapons from the U.S. over the past decade as it has sought to diversify itssupply away from its traditional military ally, Russia. Modi hasn’t entirely cut Russia outof the picture. Putin was in town last month, but the change in suppliers is likely to bereflected in the military hardware paraded before Modi and Obama in New Delhi nextweek.

As a symbol of U.S.-India cooperation, the visit is also a signal to audiences in Moscow,Beijing (India and China are locked a contentious and occasionally violent borderdispute), and of course Pakistan. Ganguly notes that the U.S. has been putting lessemphasis on relations with Pakistan as it has drawn down its presence in Afghanistan.India has also been pushing to increase its economic and political presence inAfghanistan, much to Pakistan’s chagrin.

“The Pakistanis will be quite upset about this visit and will watch it very closely,” saysGanguly. “The days when an American president felt compelled to also visit Pakistanwhen he went to India are over. The Pakistanis have to come to terms with that, butthey’re not going to like it.”

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