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WASJINGTON:
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met with U.S. and Indian technology executives in Washington on Friday, the final day of a state visit where he agreed new defence and technology cooperation and addressed challenges posed by China.
“The partnership between India and the United States will make the world better in the 21st Century. You all play a crucial role in this partnership,” said Mr. Modi while addressing the Indian diaspora at Ronald Reagan Center, Washington
In his goodbye speech to the Indian-American community at the end of his three-day US visit, Prime Minister Modi said, “In the last three days, a new and glorious journey has started for India-US relations.” He added, “‘Together India and US are not just forming policies and agreements, we are shaping lives, dreams and destinies”
“The biggest driving force of India’s growth story is the aspiration of the Indian people, which is not very different from the American dream,” said the Prime Minister, adding that “extreme poverty is fast diminishing in India, while the middle-class and neo-middle class are rapidly expanding.”
“In order to fulfil the aspirations of these people, whatever India is going to do, has opened immense possibilities for America as well,” he remarked, mentioning an increasing demand in India in the aviation sector. “To fulfil this demand, Indian airlines are ordering hundreds of aircraft from American companies, and jobs are being created here.”
U.S. President Joe Biden rolled out the red carpet for Modi on Thursday, declaring after about 2-1/2 hours of talks that their countries’ economic relationship was “booming.” Trade has more than doubled over the past decade.
Biden and Modi gathered with CEOs including Apple’s (AAPL.O) Tim Cook, Google’s (GOOGL.O) Sundar Pichai and Microsoft’s (MSFT.O) Satya Nadella.
Also present were Sam Altman of OpenAI, NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, and Indian tech leaders including Anand Mahindra, chairman of Mahindra Group, and Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries, the White House said.
“Our partnership between India and the United States will go a long way, in my view, to define what the 21st century looks like,” Biden told the group, adding that technological cooperation would be a big part of that partnership.
Observing that there were a variety of tech companies represented at the meeting from startups to well established firms, Modi said: “Both of them are working together to create a new world.”
