IndiaWest
WASHINGTON — Asserting that it is a “wonderful moment” for Indo-U.S. ties, Senator Tim Kaine has said that currently the opportunities for bilateral cooperation between the two countries are “significant.”
“This India-America moment is a wonderful one. The opportunities for cooperation are significant,” Kaine, who was recently in India, said last week at the annual Washington gala of the American India Foundation, attended by the who’s who of the community from the U.S. Capitol and its neighborhood.
“We came back with such a powerful feeling that this India is,” Kaine said at the event, where he was felicitated along with Nisha Desai Biswal, the Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia, for their inspiring leadership and philanthropic commitment to support AIF’s mission to help disadvantaged Indians.
Kaine is the current chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on the Near East, South and Central Asian Affairs, overseeing American foreign policy in this critical region, from Morocco to Bangladesh.
Praising the role of Indian Americans in nation-building and improving bilateral ties between the two countries, Kaine said the talent pool of the Indian American community is so strong and so diverse that if one were just putting together a team on the aristocracy of merit, this community would be at the forefront.
“That is an aspect of life in this country that makes the Indian American moment in the relationship between our nations so fruitful right now,” Kaine said at the AIF gala.
In all, $300,000 was raised from the sponsors, donations and from this year’s gala pledge drive and silent auction.
Biswal said Indian Americans have a key role to play in the bilateral India-U.S. relationship.
“As the Indian prime minister talks about his agenda for transforming India and his vision for the U.S.-India partnership to be a part of that transformation, the Indian American community has a very important role to play,” Biswal said.
“Transformation is not just ‘G to G’ (government to government); it’s not about PPPs, (public-private-partnerships). Those are very important equations, but it is fundamentally also about people-to-people ties,” she said.
“The U.S.-India relationship is not going to reach its full potential until the full potential of our people-to-people ties is reached,” Biswal said.
“As we look around the world, we recognize that there is no partner that the U.S. has that deeply respects our values, our views, our perspectives than the nation of India.
“The president saw that coming and declared the U.S.-India relationship to be one of the defining partnerships of the 21st century,” Biswal added.
