new delhi prime minister narendra modi is in the united states to consolidate the growing strategic ties between the two nations and explore new opportunities for bilateral cooperationthis is pm modis first foreign visit of the year and only the second international trip since the covid19 pandemic engulfed the globeties between the us and india have been on an upward swing in the last few years transcending administration changes in new delhi as well as washingtonread alsoin 7 charts how indians are ruling americaseven charts that show how indians dubbed the model minority among them google ceo sundar pichai and microsoft ceo satya nadella in pic are continuing their march towards greater learning and prosperityus presidential elections samosa caucus remains cold but intactall 4 house members of the socalled samosa caucus a group of indianamerican lawmakers were reelected in congressional elections held concurrently with the presidential polls although the cohort failed to add to its number indianamerican lawmakers dr ami bera raja krishnamoorthi pramilafrom defence to trade to peopletopeople contact the two largest democracies in the world share a multifaceted relationship that continues to evolve in the backdrop of various global challengeshere are the five key facets of indiaus ties defenceindia shares an extensive defence partnership with us which can be encapsulated under two broad categories bilateral military pacts and strategic cooperationlets start with the wider umbrella of strategic cooperationus and india have tightened their strategic embrace recently with china flexing its military muscle in the indopacific regiondefence experts have said that us views india as a regional counterweight to china in the indopacific region and has often and loudly made its intentions known on that frontfor instance the previous trump administration strongly supported india during its military conflict with china in eastern ladakh and publicly decried beijings salamislicing tacticslast year former secretary of state mike pompeo embarked on an antichina roadshow in the indian ocean islands warning countries like sri lanka and maldives against chinas intentionsthe joe biden administration has more or less picked up where its predecessors left offthe us as well as india have been speaking openly about freedom of navigation and vociferously support a free fair indopacificin october last year us india japan and australia together known as quad came together for the malabar naval exercise for the first time in 13 years this was the first indication of the militarisation of quad so far an informal alliancein march this year prime minister narendra modi along with leaders of us japan and australia held the firstever quad leaders summit in signs of deepening cooperationduring his ongoing us visit the first inperson quad meeting is high on pm modis agenda as the fournation group looks to infuse more strategic heft into the alliance and keep china on the tenterhooksbesides malabar india and us have been regularly holding several other joint exercises vajra prahar yudh abhyas tiger triumph etc which are becoming wider in scope size and complexityon the defence deals front