Did Donald Trump’s habit of shooting off the cuff with little regard to accuracy make Prime Minister Narendra Modi wary of taking his calls? A new report by the New York Times (NYT), which backs a German newspaper’s claim that Trump called PM Modi several times in recent weeks, sheds light on the circumstances that went behind the snub to the US President.
Officially, the last phone call between PM Modi and Trump was on June 17. The call took place as Trump abruptly left the G7 Summit in Canada and flew back to Washington. A bilateral meeting between Trump and Modi on the sidelines of the G7 had to be cancelled.
During the call, Trump asked Modi for a stopover in Washington, but the request was denied as the Prime Minister had a prior commitment to visit Croatia.
In hindsight, India was wary that Trump might try to pressure PM Modi into a photo-op with Pakistan’s Army chief Asim Munir, who was invited for lunch at the White House at the same time. India and Pakistan being hyphenated on US soil would have been bad optics for India.
Since then, ties between India and the US have hit a rough patch. Trump slapped India with a 50% tariff and halted trade deal negotiations over New Delhi’s reluctance to open its agriculture and dairy sectors.
According to the NYT report, later on, there was an attempt to set up a call between Trump and Modi to finalise a partial trade deal.
However, with the trust between the US and India, a longtime Washington ally, at an all-time low, India was cautious of a Modi-Trump call.
A senior Indian official told the NYT that the higher echelons of the Modi government were concerned of Trump posting whatever he wanted on his social media platform, Truth Social, no matter what was discussed or agreed to on the call.
With the trade deal making no headway, an infuriated Trump tried reaching out to PM Modi “several times”, the NYT reported. However, the Prime Minister did not respond to those requests.
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