100 days of Trump: India wins points, but yet to score

palpably reduced, New Delhi remains uncertain about the strategic bedrock of the relationship. The deciding factors: The trajectory of Trump’s relations with Chinese leader Xi Jinping and how the US sees Afghanistan’s future.

The Indian government has met every star in the Trump constellation. From son-in-law Jared Kushner to ideologue-inchief Stephen Bannon, from selfeffacing secretary of state Rex Tillerson to National Security Adviser HR McMaster, New Delhi has reached out to all and sundry.

The Indian government has been “strategically reassured”, say senior officials, and the atmosphere is positive. But India has yet to really register on the Trump worldview.

The Indian interest of past US presidents, notably George W Bush and Barack Obama, was driven by their sense India was an important piece in their strategic jigsaw puzzle. Trump is the first White House resident since World War I who has come to office without a geopolitical mural painted in his mind.

US actions remain wayward. The decision to drop the “mother of all bombs” in Afghanistan and the order to send a carrier task force to North Korea, it now seems, were not executive signals. They were acts of local US military commanders.

Trump gave a thumbs-up post facto. On the other hand, the Syrian cruise missile strike was an Oval Office order. India has a number of positives to sell to the US: Common views on Islamist terror, a broadly similar stance on China and an appetite for lowcost US hydrocarbon exports.