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 The U.S. Ambassador to India, Nancy Powell, met opposition leader
Narendra Modi at his residence in Gandhinagar, the capital of
Gujarat state, where he is chief minister.
It was the highest-profile encounter between U.S. officials and Modi
since the State Department revoked his visa in 2005 over the
bloodshed in Gujarat three years previously.
It marked the end of a boycott of Modi, although there was no
specific mention of his visa status. Officials and analysts said
that if he was to become prime minister, the United States was
unlikely to uphold its ban.
The U.S. embassy characterized the meeting as part of its "outreach"
to leaders of India's main political parties before elections, which
are due by May.
Powell's talks with Modi and others in Gujarat focused on the
importance of the U.S.-India relationship, regional security, human
rights, and U.S. trade and investment, it said in a statement.
But its chief significance was clear. Television footage showed
Powell shaking Modi's hand and smiling, while he gave her a bunch of
red and yellow flowers.
The meeting took place, however, at a delicate time.
The two countries are developing closer commercial and strategic
ties and share almost $100 billion worth of annual trade. But their
often volatile relationship has come under strain because of a
simmering trade dispute and a row over the arrest of an Indian
diplomat in New York after she was accused of visa fraud and
underpaying her maid.
Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, is considered the favorite to
form a government after the general election.
"The guy would be prime minister and that's different from being
chief minister. You can't shut out the prime minister of one of our
largest allies and someone who frankly is very pro-American," a
congressional source in Washington told Reuters.
Modi's record as chief minister of Gujarat has been overshadowed by
the riots 12 years ago in which Hindu mobs killed at least 1,000
people, most of them Muslims. Rights groups and political rivals
have long alleged he allowed or actively encouraged the attacks.
The violence erupted after 59 people, mostly Hindu pilgrims, were
killed in a fire on a train.
Modi, a Hindu nationalist, has always denied accusations he allowed
or encouraged the attacks on Muslims. A Supreme Court inquiry found
no evidence to prosecute him.
VISA ON MERIT
BJP senior leader Arun Jaitley said the U.S. boycott of Modi had not
been based on any evidence or court verdict but on "excessive
propaganda".
"For us in the BJP, the meeting is a part of the diplomatic
routine," he said in a statement.
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The Congress party, who leads the ruling coalition, appeared to play
down a meeting which some interpreted as a sign that the United
States expected Modi to win the election .
"Did we celebrate that he did not get visa? Are we going to be
depressed that he got the visa?" Foreign Minister Salman Khurshid
said.
The U.S. State Department said any application for a visa would be
treated on its merits.
But the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, a
government agency which recommended that visas be denied to Modi in
2005, said it had not changed its position.
"Neither the passage of time nor any change in Mr. Modi's position
in government absolves him and his government of their alleged
involvement, negligence, and complicity in the 2002 violence," its
chairman, Robert George, told Reuters.
Govinda Acharya of rights group Amnesty International said other
foreign leaders accused of human rights violations often went to the
United States.
"I would speculate that Modi, if he became prime minister, would be
able to visit the United States with diplomatic immunity, but not
for a private visit. He would certainly be able to come, I would
imagine, to the United Nations."
Britain became the first European country to end the boycott on
meeting Modi, which had been in place since the riots. Other
European countries followed suit last year.
Republican lawmakers recently visited Gujarat and invited him to the
United States.
U.S. automaker Ford is due to open a plant this year in Gujarat,
where Modi has been praised by businessmen for cutting red tape.
General Motors already has a production facility there.
Zahir Janmohamed, a rights activist who took part in the original
campaign against Modi's visa in 2005, said he saw the rapprochement
as pragmatic politics.
"I don't see this as a policy shift, because if you look at last
year's State Department rights report, the U.S. still has some
strong concerns about Modi. I think it's just a very practical thing
the U.S. has to do."
(Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in Washington;
writing by
Angus MacSwan; editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Robert Birsel)
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