Washington: Indian and American officials have scheduled a series of meetings before the year-end to follow up on decisions taken during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's maiden meeting with US President Barack Obama here in September to ensure their time-bound implementation.
The two sides have scheduled more than a dozen-odd high-level interactions on topics ranging from education, trade, science and technology and strategic affairs in the coming weeks.
Modi, who is very strong on follow ups, has directed his officials for a timely implementation of the decisions as mentioned in the Indo-US joint communique issued on September 30 during his visit to Washington.
One of the meetings of the Defence Policy Group was held at the Pentagon last week, which was attended by US Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel, reflecting the significance being attached to India-US defence ties by the Obama Administration.
The venue for most of the series of these meetings now shifts to New Delhi, which would host the Higher Education Dialogue on November 17, and the first-ever India-US Technology Summit on November 18 and 19.
John Holdren, Assistant to the US President for Science and Technology, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Co-Chair of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) will lead the US delegation to the Summit.
Holdren would also lead the US-delegation for a meeting of the India-US Science and Technology Commission in New Delhi on November 17, while on November 21 officials of the two countries would hold meeting on high-tech co-operation.
In less than a week, New Delhi would host the first meeting of the high-level working group on intellectual property, which was established after the Modi-Obama meeting.
Constituted as part of the Trade Policy Forum (TPF), the working group would sort out the contentious issues which have been hampering investments.
And the next day, for the first time in two years, officials of the two countries would meet for the Trade Policy Forum meeting.
It is the principal trade dialogue between the countries.
It has five focus groups: Agriculture, Investment, Innovation and Creativity (Intellectual Property Rights), Services, and Tariff and Non-Tariff Barriers.
The India US Civil Aviation Working Group would also meet in November.
