The Indian public’s diplomatic mind space has been largely taken over by India-US relations on account of the comments, policies and actions of President Donald Trump. The reason for this is the impact of the Trump administration’s imposition of tariffs amounting to over 50% on Indian exports to the US. The tariffs are having an adverse impact on Indian exports and leading to some lay-offs in labour intensive export oriented businesses. It is good that the probability of serious trade talks has increased but it is still not entirely clear how the issue of Indian imports of Russian oil would be resolved; India has insisted that it will continue to purchase oil from Russia.

Despite this pre-occupation India’s diplomatic machinery has continued with the country’s global engagements. Within the last month India has had four Heads of Governments level bilateral summits. The Prime Ministers of Fiji, Singapore and Mauritius visited India while Prime Minister Narendra Modi went to Japan prior to attending the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Tianjin, China. Interestingly, all these interactions of Modi were with leaders of island countries. All were important for India’s immediate and long-term interests. These visits show that India’s diplomatic and political leadership has the capability to promote Indian interests even as it handles a difficult phase in India-US ties.

Each of these four visits which were........

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