Finance
A key US congressional body will hold a public hearing next week to analyze the trajectory of the India-US strategic partnership, with a focus on the shifting defense, economic, and diplomatic dimensions of the relationship.
The meeting, titled “The US-India Strategic Partnership: Securing a Free and Open Indo-Pacific,” is set for December 10, according to an official hearing notice from the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on South and Central Asia.
The subcommittee, chaired by Congressman Bill Huizenga of Michigan, will hear testimony from top analysts who monitor India’s growing position in the Indo-Pacific.
Jeff Smith, Director of the Heritage Foundation’s Asian Studies Centre; Dhruva Jaishankar, Executive Director of ORF America; and Sameer Lalwani, Senior Fellow with the Indo-Pacific Program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, have all been announced as witnesses.
The hearing is scheduled to focus on India’s defense modernization, increased military interoperability with the US, technology collaboration, regional diplomacy, and collaborative efforts to secure a rules-based Indo-Pacific.
It comes as Washington and New Delhi extend their collaborative efforts in vital technologies, marine domain awareness, and supply chain diversification.
The India-US cooperation has sparked bipartisan interest in Congress, with members seeing New Delhi as a key pillar of US Indo-Pacific policy.
Hearings of this sort allow lawmakers to examine policy, assess issues, and reaffirm long-term commitments to one of America’s most important bilateral relationships.
The announcement of a congressional hearing comes as Russian President Vladimir Putin arrives in New Delhi for a two-day summit meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The three witnesses, Jeff Smith, Dhruva Jaishankar, and Sameer Lalwani, are well-known Indian experts based in the American capital.
In recent years, both countries have also increased cooperation through the US-India Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET), which has opened up new opportunities for collaboration in artificial intelligence, quantum technologies, semiconductors, and defense innovation.
The Indo-Pacific focus has increased India’s relevance in Washington in diplomatic, security, and supply-chain contexts.
Source: IANS
