Convergence of heritage of two great nations as Manmohan Singh, Obama meet on Nov 24

By O.J.George

Whatever the long-past antipathy, the meeting between Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh and US President Barack Obama on November 24 at the White House would reinforce the reckoning achieved by the two countries in the recent past.

India and the US are two great democracies and in spite of cultural differences, there are a lot of meeting points on fundamentals revolving round democratic governance.

The greatest asset of both the countries is that people enjoy democratic freedom, which is not that real in many other countries.

In spite of China making giant strides in development, industry, commerce and the like, that country cannot boast of democratic elections and enjoyment of freedom by the people.

Whatever the bonhomie the US and China have developed, there would always be the rider of absence of total freedom.

The US has the past sin of cosying up to Pakistan at the cost of relations with India. But it seems the US has learnt a lesson from the September 11 terror attack. Whether it admits publicly or not, the hide-out of various elements of terrorists is in Pakistan one way or other.

The governments in Pakistan from time to time failed to rein in the terror elements for fear of their being thrown out and so stability is lacking there. If some elements in Pakistan get hold of the nuclear weapons, they could terrify the world.

It is in the interest of US as well that terrorist elements in Pakistan are rooted out and Indian fears reckoned. The Afghanistan tangle also requires the participation of India.

India and the US by developing strategic relations, through the civil nuclear agreement and afterwards, there could be significant contributions in dealing with terrorism.

The US cannot expect India to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty as such, for it was to deal with this issue mostly that the civil nuclear agreement was executed.

Indirectly, it was reckoned as an accepted nuclear power. There can be no going back on it. No amount of pressure will move India sign on the dotted lines.

Mutual acceptance, strategic partnership and development together could mark the outcome of the Manmohan-Obama meeting.