Partnership is best way to describe Indo-US ties: Navtej Sarna

WASHINGTON: Partnership is the best way to describe burgeoning Indo-US ties, the top Indian diplomat here has said as he highlighted the role of highly-skilled professionals from India in making American companies globally competitive.

Indian Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna's remarks came amid the Trump administration's clampdown on H1B visas, the most sought after by Indian IT professionals.

In April, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order for tightening the rules of the H-1B visa programme to stop "visa abuses".

Trump said his administration is going to enforce 'Hire American' rules that are designed to protect jobs and wages of workers in the US.

Sarna said that Indian Diaspora and the industry has played a key role in strengthening the Indo-US relationship.

"What people may know less is that a large number of Indian corporates are invested in the United States, and are investing money and technology and also sharing very highly skilled professions, which frankly are a crucial factor in making American companies globally competitive," he said.

He said that "partnership" is the best way to describe India-US relationship.

Other than partnership, Sarna said, "it's very difficult to see, where does India fit in with the US".

"It is not an ally in classical sense and neither it is part of an umbrella grouping. India's relationship with the US is many ways that of a partnership, as the countries who have a lot to offer each other at the moment," he said.

"I think that is the sort of perspective that if you put that spotlight on the relationship you tend to get the most out of it, and then that governs how you treat each other, how you relate to each other, how you plan to move ahead together," Sarna said ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's maiden trip to the US later this month.

And frankly, he said, it's very difficult to think of another partner for the US, which is such a thriving and huge democracy with very deep democratic roots.

"If you are looking at that sort of partner who understands these, then I don't think frankly, on the scale of India, there is any other country in the world," Sarna said.