Celebrating 75 years of Indo-American diplomatic ties

By BRIAN HEATH

Across the United States on the Fourth of July, Americans will come together to celebrate our independence, and renew our commitment to the values that shaped the founding of our country – equality, self-governance, and the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The US and India – the world’s oldest and largest democracies – share these values, which form the bedrock of our relationship. When President Biden and Prime Minister Modi met in Tokyo in May, they renewed our countries’ commitment to a bilateral relationship rooted in a shared tradition of democracy and equal opportunity for all.

We are tackling some pressing challenges together. From fighting the climate crisis, to leading the global pandemic response, to advancing a free and open Indo-Pacific, the US and India are collaborating across nearly every field of endeavor to improve the lives of our peoples and contribute to the global good. Our partnership at 75 demonstrates how vital US-India cooperation has been in realising a more prosperous, free, connected, and secure world and how much potential there is for our partnership to grow.

Our relationship far transcends our government-to-government engagement. Since the first documented immigrant from India to the US arrived in 1790 on a British ship from Madras, as it was then called, it is the bonds between our peoples that provide the foundation upon which our relationship is built. When Dr Martin Luther King, Jr made his historic visit to India to pay homage to Mahatma Gandhi in 1959, he included Chennai in his itinerary, speaking at Presidency College. From India’s own independence movement to the US civil rights movement, our countries’ stories are interwoven throughout history. In my travels over the past year, I have seen how our connections between Indians and Americans benefit the lives of thousands of our citizens every day. In Tamil Nadu, and across a consular district that includes Karnataka, Kerala, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Lakshadweep, and Puducherry, we have hosted high-level visitors from the US Senate and from NASA, each seeking to explore new avenues of cooperation and to better understand how our two nations can accomplish more together. Through a joint mission between our space agencies, due to launch in 2023, we will study Earth’s changing ecosystems, generating important data about global environmental change. And after a hugely successful Aero India 2021 at Yelahanka Air Force Station, Bengaluru, we look forward to participation at Aero India 2023.

At nearly $12.7 billion, India is one of the fastest-growing sources of investments in the US. Since the Select USA program began, companies in our consular district have made approximately $69.5 million in investment in the US. With over 1,000 US companies represented within the Chennai consular district alone, it is clear both bilateral trade and commercial partnerships continue to thrive, creating jobs and advancing economic development in both countries. Through the US Agency for International Development, or USAID, we help address healthcare accessibility throughout the consular district, supporting climate change mitigation and sustainable land use practices in Kerala, and empowering women to own and operate enterprises closer to their homes.

The US-India partnership at 75 is getting stronger. We are not celebrating 75 years of Washington-New Delhi relations, but 75 years of relations between the entirety of our countries and our peoples. As President Biden said to PM Modi, “There’s so much our countries can and will do together, and I am committed to making the US-India partnership among the closest we have on Earth.”

Brian Heath is Acting Deputy Chief of Mission, US Embassy, New Delhi; Excerpted from a speech delivered during the 4th of July celebrations in Chennai.

Brian Heath