New Delhi: Following the first-ever Quad virtual summit, Indian Ambassador to the United States Taranjit Singh Sandhu emphasized that the relations between New Delhi and Washington are going “much deeper”. Justifying his statement, he said,” this was very much reflected in the equation between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Joe Biden in Friday’s virtual meet.”
Mr Taranjit recalled the 2014 and 2016 events that portrayed a virtuous equation between PM Modi and then Vice-President Biden. He further said, “At the Quad summit, you could see that in the first five minutes of public viewing. The general atmosphere was very good amongst all the leaders. The India-US relationship is much deeper and this was very much reflected in the equation between PM Modi and President Biden.”
The summit terminated with a joint announcement of an in-person meeting by the end of 2021. Meanwhile, New Delhi is expected to conduct discussions over intended steps to take forward the Quad initiative, with US Secretary of Défense Lloyd Austin visiting India.
While reflecting on the cooperation and similar vision of the four democracies, Mr. Sandhu said, “The United States is bringing in technology. India has a vaccine production capability, and Japan is financing. And of course, Australia is coming in with logistics–there are three clear areas: health care and vaccine production; the second is IT and the third is climate change.”
Following the 90minute long summit, the Quad nations penned down initiatives to curb China’s illegitimate supremacy. The Quad established the proposal under which India will receive investments to roll out a billion coronavirus vaccine doses by 2022 for exports to the Indo-Pacific region, seen as a significant step to counter China’s expanding vaccine diplomacy.