It's complicated: What Trump means for India-US ties

Understanding what Donald Trump means for India requires an examination of what Trump seeks for America, and placing India, which is an important actor for US strategy but not as indispensable as some in India like to believe, within that framework.

- Prashant Jha

But understanding what Trump means for India also requires an examination of what Washington DC means for New Delhi, what makes it possible for New Delhi to achieve those aims, and placing the possible orientation of Trump administration, within that framework.

A Trump administration, by being less pub- PIC licly interventionist in domestic politics and THE more sensitive to some internal security concerns, is likely to create political space for New Delhi to continue deepening ties with the US. This is especially so in the backdrop of increasing political pressure on the government from its own base to rethink its approach to the US because of perceived not necessarily real - slights from the Democratic administration.

At the same time, a Trump administration may make it difficult for Delhi to extract the real economic and technological goods that it needs from the US in order to meet its developmental and strategic goals. It may also force a set of uncomfortable conversations around the issue of "religious freedom".

Whether the greater political space will lead to greater convergence on economic and technological goals, or whether the discord on economic and technological matters shrinks the political space is the key question in the next four years.

Let's examine what Trump wants to do, or at least has said he wants to do, in his second and final term in office.