Washington: An official said on Monday that the US ambassador Nancy Powell is planning to meet with the Prime Ministerial candidate of BHP, Narendra Modi. It signals at a turnaround after years of shunning him over anti-Muslim riots.
The appointment between Narendra Modi and Powell has been confirmed by state department official.
The official said, “This is part of our concentrated outreach to senior political and business leaders which began in November to highlight the US-India relationship.”
Human rights groups say that Modi turned a blind eye to riots in 2002 that killed up to 2,000 people, most of them Muslims.
The United States in 2005 revoked a visa for Modi under a domestic law that bars entry by any foreign official seen as responsible for “severe violations of religious freedom.”
Notify that Modi has denied wrongdoing and investigations have cleared him of personal blame, although one of his former ministers was jailed for life for instigating the killing of 97 Muslims.
The United States and India have built a growing relationship since estrangement in the Cold War, with most US lawmakers supportive of ties with New Delhi.
But Modi has faced opposition from an unlikely mix of left-leaning members of the US Congress active on human rights and conservatives concerned over the status of evangelical Christians.
A congressional aide said a meeting with Powell would send a signal of US openness on issuing a visa — an issue on which the United States has little way of changing course unless Modi again applies to travel to the United States.
The aide said, “A meeting with the ambassador could be a way of signalling, ‘You’ll get a visa’, without having to say it, which she can’t.”
Modi has sought to portray himself as a business-savvy leader who can champion India’s economy and tackle corruption after a decade of rule by the left-leaning Congress party.
Meanwhile if Modi elected as Prime Minister, he would be highly unlikely to experience hassles with travel to the United States, which generally allows visits by leaders of friendly countries. For example, President Barack Obama invited his Kenyan counterpart Uhuru Kenyatta, charged by the International Criminal Court over 2007-8 post-election violence, to a US-Africa summit in August.
But some US officials are believed to have worried that bitterness over the past visa rejection would cloud relations with Modi if he becomes Prime Minister.
Milan Vaishnav, an India expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said, “Officials at the White House and state department are acutely aware that the prospect of a Modi prime ministership would create some real awkwardness for the United States. Here we have a major strategic partner, with whom we have a robust and growing relationship, but whose future leader is not allowed on US soil.”
He also said, “A lot of the pressure comes from the private sector, which says that India is a big market for us, it’s an area of growth and opportunity, and if our policy doesn’t change, US firms could be at a competitive disadvantage compared with European businesses.”
Bureau Report
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