Why this Modi visit to America will be different
New York and Silicon Valley are as different as chalk and cheese. Over the next six days, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will sample both. In New York he will meet "suit-boot" Wall Street billionaires whom Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi - himself a closet suit-boot type currently in the US on a personal visit - accuses the PM of favouring.
In Silicon Valley, though, Modi will talk shop with techies who favour hoodies (Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg often attends business meetings wearing a hoodie - though lately, now that at 31, he's an elder tech statesman, he too has joined the suit-boot brigade). Zuckerberg, of course, unlike Wall Streeters, doesn't have his own office cabin. He sits with his employees at a modest workstation in Facebook's Menlo Park headquarters.
After a quick stopover in Ireland on Wednesday, September 23, and a delegation-level working lunch with Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny, Modi will fly to New York to talk up the India story to hedge fund managers, investment bankers and industry CEOs. The prime minister will address the UN Sustainable Development summit, convened by UN secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon, on September 25.
In Silicon Valley, the prime minister will unveil the Digital India initiative to the world's technology elite. His visit to energy and automotive innovator Tesla will be closely watched. Along with Google's and Apple's driverless cars, which are currently being test-driven in California, Tesla's electric car saves energy and reduces carbon emissions - themes that resonate strongly with both Modi and US President Barack Obama.
In San Jose, on Sunday, September 27, Modi will have his Madison Square Garden moment - replete with a sell-out Californian NRI crowd and slogan-shouting protesters. The prime minister will also kick-start the "India-US Start-Up Konnect" programme to help innovative Indian start-ups strike up alliances in the US.
On his swing back from California to New York on Monday, September 28, Modi will attend a peacekeeping summit hosted by Obama on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) meeting. When Modi meets a visibly greying Obama in New York - their third bilateral in twelve months - the agenda will be a mix of business and politics. The focus will be on clean energy. Obama is chairing a UN conference on climate change and his meetings with Modi will include a high-powered US delegation with vice-president Joe Biden in attendance. India earlier this week cleared the purchase from the US of advanced Boeing helicopters for $3.10 billion (Rs 20,200 crore). It will be a good conversation opener during the Modi-Obama bilateral.
Apart from clean energy and climate change, Modi's meeting with Obama will turn on three pivots: one, attracting US companies to "Make in India" and boost overall India-US merchandise trade; two, evolving a geopolitical strategy to counter the China-Pakistan axis that threatens both Indian and US interests in Asia; and three, pushing for reforms in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) where formal "text" discussions have begun.
Obama, however, is already somewhat of a lame-duck president. Modi knows that in just over a year he'll have to do business with a new US president: Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden (if he decides to run) or a Republican dark horse. The shadow, meanwhile, of a grim-faced Nawaz Sharif will follow the Modi-Obama parleys. The US, after being conned by Pakistan for 14 years (and $30 billion) since the 9/11 terror attack, has finally read it the riot act. Aid has been cut and US drone attacks on the Taliban intensified.
Washington though is in a state of political flux. The maverick tycoon Donald Trump, with a net worth of $10 billion (Rs 66,000 crore), is leading opinion polls among Republican contenders for the 2016 US presidential election. Trump, well-known in India for his new uber-luxury Trump Tower high-rise in south Mumbai, controversially wants to build a wall on the US-Mexico border to keep illegal immigrants out. In the first Republican TV debate he outraged viewers by telling Fox TV's star anchor Megyn Kelly that she had "blood coming out from wherever".
Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, faces a trust deficit following her use of a private server for official emails when she was secretary of state during President Obama's first term. The Left-leaning Bernie Sanders leads her in some opinion polls (especially in New Hamshire) for the Democratic nomination. Vice-president Joe Biden is mulling a run. If he does, he could seriously hurt Hillary's chances. Biden has received an outpouring of public support after losing his son Beau to brain cancer in May 2015. If anyone can credibly challenge Hillary for the Democratic nomination - as a young attorney called Barack Obama successfully did in 2008 - it's Biden. At the moment, however, Hillary remains the clear favourite in a weak field.
The Pakistan shadow
A meeting between Modi and Sharif in New York - or between their respective National Security Advisors (NSAs) Ajit Doval and Sartaj Aziz - will be a mere photo-op even if it does occur. Nothing of substance can emerge given Pakistan's perfidy.
Within days of the meeting between teams of the Border Security Force (BSF) and Pakistan's Rangers in Delhi on September 9-12, Pakistan began unprovoked firing along the Line of Control (LoC) and International Border (IB), killing or injuring both soldiers and civilians. Subsequent flag meetings at brigadier level will likely stay Pakistan's hand only temporarily.
Meanwhile, reversing Modi's US itinerary, Chinese President Xi Jinping began an official state visit to the US (his first since taking office) on the west coast on Tuesday, September 22, meeting many of the tech CEOs - including those of Amazon and Microsoft - whom Modi will encounter days later.
Xi arrives in Washington on Thursday, September 24. Obama will host the Chinese president at a formal black-tie dinner at the White House. That will not conceal the undercurrent of tension between the two men: the US could well impose sanctions on Chinese entities for economic cyber attacks - but only after Xi's visit ends, later this week.
All the while, Sharif, beady-eyed and anxious, awaits Modi in New York for a quick handshake and perhaps a bit more. Clearly, India needs to evolve a new policy to deal with Pakistan and China - the elephant in the room. As the US disengages from Afghanistan and Pakistan, China has replaced it as Islamabad's principal partner in aid, trade and infrastructure. India's challenge is to sculpt a sustainable strategy to deal with the growing China-Pakistan axis. There is a convergence of interests between India and the US in doing this.
How will this convergence between Delhi and Washington play out while the China-Pakistan relationship gathers momentum and reaches critical mass? That and more in the second part of this article as the prime minister embarks on his coast-to-coast surge across America.