Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (left) met US President Barack Obama in New York on Monday and discussed a range of issues, including climate change and terrorism. The two leaders met for nearly an hour./ Photo from PM Modi's Facebook

1

By Ha Man-joo, India correspondent, AsiaToday - Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the US demonstrated the elevated status of India. On Tuesday, Modi tweeted, "I shared my thoughts on key global issues at the UN and also met many world leaders to strengthen India's ties with the global community.

In fact, PM Modi had a series of bilateral, and multilateral talks with world leaders from 10 different countries during his five-day visit to the US, and discussed key global issues including UNSC reforms, terrorism, and climate change. In addition, Modi met global company CEOs to explain his initiatives such as 'Make in India, and Digital India' and successfully attracted investments. He also met international organization heads, including UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and World Bank President Jim Yong Kim.

On the last day of his trip, Modi met US President Barack Obama and got support for India's permanent membership of the UN Secretary Council. While Modi expressed support for Obama over climate change issues, he also reflected the position of India and developing countries, stating, "The climate change agreement should also focus on access to finance and technology for the developing world, especially the poor countries and small island states."

Modi also had a bilateral meeting with British Prime Minister David Cameron and French President Francois Hollande, and extracted positive response for India's permanent UNSC membership demand.

Modi's US tour mostly devoted to a push for business. He flew to the West Coast for his visit to California from September 26-27 to met top CEOs, including Apple CEO Tim Cook, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google's CEO Sundar Pichai, MS CEO Satya Nadella, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, and more. Pichai, Nadella, and Narayen are Indian-born CEOs.

Ahead of this, Modi attended a dinner with over 50 CEOs from the Fortune 500 companies on September 25. During the series of meetings, he explained his economic initiatives, such as 'Make in India' and 'Digital India while continuing his pitch that India is open for business.

In response, there are tangible results. Google decided to equip 400 railways station in India with high speed Wi-Fi networks with Mumbai Central being the first station to get covered.