NEW YORK, USA: The US India Security council had a video conference with Senator Mark Warner (Co-Chair of Senate India Caucus) on July 21st. The conference was attended by Ramesh Kapur, Krishna Srinivasa, Bharat Barai, Koty Krishna, Anil Deshpande, Nar Koppula, Rajendar Dichpally and staff of Senator Mark Warner.
Senator Mark Warner who was recently appointed to the Intelligence committee expressed his concerns in the US Business Organizations doing business with China and said Intellectual theft was a major concern and in addition, there was the issue of taking the profits out of China due to the communist party restrictions. He also expressed grave concerns on Chinese surveillance on every aspect of the Organizations doing business with China.
Ramesh Kapur said that in view of the present scenario, it would make better sense to shift all manufacturing back to the USA and in areas where there were issues of cost due to labor and other issues, it would make sense to shift the manufacturing to India for all US companies which are at present in China.
Krishna Srinivasa said that it is time for the US and India to forge a long-lasting defense partnership that will sustain for at least 40-50 years and requested the senator to pursue the defense partnership with his friends in the senate like Senator Menendez and others.
Bharat Barai said that many medium and small-scale electronic companies in the USA and India have suffered due to unfair trade practices of China and also offered the Senator his services in arranging a meeting with Indian Prime Minister – Narender Modi.
Koty Krishna said he did a lot of business with China earlier and always was worried about the issue of getting back his money from China and is glad that he has moved out of China.
Nar Koppula told the Senator that the Indian American community has always helped the Senator in his elections and will continue to do so and asked the Senator to be favorable to a stronger US-India partnership.
Rajendra Dichpally expressed concerns on the Chinese aggression against India and warned that their attitude will not be limited to the South Asian and Pacific region and China will expand its ambitions and will be a threat to the US in the future due to its vast ambitions. All the members agreed that it is absolutely necessary to rein in China with partnerships with other friendly countries.
Senator Mark Warner said that the USA will work with countries like India, Japan, Korea, etc to tackle the threat from China. He also said that he has sponsored an amendment 29 to the NDAA act to make India a strategic defense partner of the USA on a permanent basis and he will talk to other Senators to get this bill passed and an executive order signed. He also said that he spoke to the Indian Ambassador recently and the ambassador discussed with him some vital information on Kashmir which he as Co-Chair of Senate India Caucus was not aware of and suggested that India should hire a good US-based Public Relations firm which will disseminate the information to the press on a regular basis.
