View from Blair House.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi landed at St Andrews in Washington DC for a meeting with newly elected President Donald Trump. HT. "Trump makes bold accusations" and "On the table, he offers temporary relief but seeks maximum concessions," wrote Ajay Srivastava. His advice is to confront Trump with facts. US companies, which are not allowed in China, are earning billions from services in India, Indian students are paying enormous sums of money to US universities and high tariffs do not help America. So do not cut tariffs on US products. The trouble with confronting Trump is that the US was India's largest trading partner with total trade of $119.7 billion and a trade surplus of $45.7 billion in the financial year 2023 -24 (FY24). CNN. China was at number two with total trade of $118.4 billion, with a trade deficit of $85.1 billion in FY24. Exports to China were a negligible $8 billion. US companies, Google, X (formerly Twitter) and Meta, are free for users in India. No Indian company will dream of offering free service. Baidu is the search engine in China while Google serves the rest of the world. Investopedia. While US companies are earning in India, they are also increasing our exports and creating jobs. Pune consultant Wizmatic estimates that 1,500 Global Capability Centers (GCC) of multinational companies "employ 3.2 million Indians (mostly engineers and scientists), generate revenue of $121 billion and export $102 billion," wrote Swaminathan SA Aiyar. Although Trump wants to India to reduce tariffs on American products and facilitate the return of illegal migrants from India, "Chances are that the Modi-Trump meeting will go smoothly," wrote Lisa Curtis. Trump wants India to buy US defense equipment, to be active in the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or the Quad (wikipedia), as a shield against China in the Indo-Pacific, and to cooperate in the Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies (iCET) dialogue (wikipedia). HT. As for Indian students, almost all go to the US to stay their permanently and become citizens if they can. Recently, 104 illegal migrants from India were deported in a US military plane. According to a report by the Pew Research Center, there are 725,000 Indians living in the US illegally. AP. "Indians seeking asylum in the US grew from 9,000 in 2018 to 51,000 in 2023, a 466% rise in 5 years, shows a study by researchers from Johns Hopkins University." India Today. Of the 96 Gujaratis, who were deported from France in December 2023, "Within months of returning home, nearly 70 of them made their way into the US, while the remaining 26 - who also embarked on a journey to enter America illegally - are currently stuck in a Sharjah hotel." TOI. Even as Mr Modi relaxes in Blair House, known as the world's most exclusive hotel, as guest of President Trump (HT), he will not see thousands of Indians trying to sneak into the US across the Mexican and Canadian borders dreaming of getting any menial job and building a life there. This is like sending hundreds of thousands of Indian beggars into the US. They will take anything. Because, we cannot be choosers (wiktionary).