India and the US have decided to take a big leap in broad-basing their strategic ties in several critical areas, with President Donald Trump announcing after talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi that Washington is paving the way to provide New Delhi with F-35 fighter jets as part of increasing military supplies by billions of dollars.After holding wide-ranging talks with Modi, Trump said there is a “special bond” between the world’s oldest and largest democracies and both sides decided to shore up cooperation in diverse areas such as energy, critical technologies and connectivity.
“Starting this year, we will be increasing military sales to India by many billions of dollars,” Trump said at a joint press conference with Modi.