Political leaders also have right to unwind

US President Barack Obama sweeping down in Marine One for an exhilarating, impromptu tour of Stonehenge on his way back from presumably grim Nato deliberations in Newport in Britain may give some world leaders ideas.

As knotty issues of geopolitics and commerce have them jetting across time zones with nary a break anyway, getting in a bit of sightseeing on the side is understandable. Had Obama not been a bona fide VIP, he would not have been allowed to walk right up to the 5,000-year-old circle of stone monoliths, as ordinary tourists have to wait for the summer solstice for that privilege.

It was fortuitous indeed that an item on his 'bucket list' —as he put it — was actually en route back home and could be ticked off with just a minimal extra cost to American taxpayers and minimal inconvenience to British commuters who were stuck on the highway as the presidential convoy transited from the helipad to the site. How many other must-sees the thrifty Obamas have crossed off thus in the course of their global engagements are unknown, but it may be recalled that they did not 'drop in' to see the Taj Mahal in 2010, though the then-French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife did so later that year.

But a dekko at the Statue of Liberty will surely figure in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s bucket list for his imminent US trip.…