US President Donald Trump will be visiting India between 24 – 26 February with a motive to further strengthen the U.S.-India strategic partnership, and to reinforce the social ties between the two countries. Apart from the strategic importance, one major reason why the US is much important for India is because it is India’s largest trade partner as well. The US accounts for nearly 16 per cent of India’s overall exports while India imports only around 7 per cent of its overall imports from the US, according to the Department of Commerce. This is why India recorded a trade surplus of USD 17 billion in the last fiscal. The large trade and strategic importance keep the country on the top of India’s priority.

“The United States is India’s important strategic partner for achieving our developmental objectives as also regional and global aspirations,” V K Singh, MoS, Ministry of External Affairs, said in a reply to a question in Lok Sabha last week. Over the years, India and the US have made concerted efforts to capture the true strength and scale of our strategic, political and economic opportunities and India looks forward to further expanding and deepening its strategic partnership with the US in the coming years, V K Singh added.

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the United States between 6 – 8 June 2016 at the invitation of the then US President Barack Obama. There were significant and concrete outcomes from the visit in key areas of cooperation such as civil nuclear, clean energy, defence and security, economy and people-to-people ties which were reflected in the Joint Statement titled “The United States and India: Enduring Global Partners in the 21st Century”, issued during the visit.