Jitters in New Delhi's corridors of power.

With President Trump having lost the election, there is a growing sense of uncertainty and trepidation in the corridors of power in New Delhi.

The reasons are obvious. Indian PM Modi invested heavily in Trump's election campaign. Over the last four years, a close personal chemistry developed between President Trump and PM Modi which became a defining feature of US-India relations. Modi held a royal 'Namaste Trump' reception when he visited India, while at the 'Howdy Modi' rally in Texas in September 2019, Trump hailed Modi as one of 'America's greatest, most devoted and most loyal friends'.

Kindred spirits, both Trump and Modi thrived on the politics of exclusion and pursued a far-right agenda. Modi ignored the impending COVID crisis and invited Trump and his family to India and organised a massive rally in Ahmedabad for him in the last week of February 2020. This was an opportunity for Trump to show to American voters his global popularity as well as to give a strong message to Indian origin voters in the USA to support him in the election. There are 1.2 million Indian-origin American voters. When Modi had travelled to Houston, Texas, he gave a call 'Ab ki baar, Trump sarkar' to his supporters, which was an alteration of his own campaign slogan. The Trump camp even released a video at the Republican National Convention a year later, which claimed Modi's 'Ab ki baar, Trump sarkar' call as an endorsement of Trump.

Besides Modi's open endorsements, the Modi-supporting Hindutva organisations in the US, the Overseas Friends of BJP-USA and US-HSS (Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh, the overseas counterpart of the RSS) were at the forefront of supporting and contributing to Trump's election campaign.

As part of his deal with Modi, Trump remained completely silent on the plight of minorities in India and erosion of political rights in Kashmir under the BJP government. The Trump administration did not also take the Modi regime to task when the US Commission on International Religious Freedom in its various reports strongly criticised the deteriorating religious freedom in India. Even the CIA classification of two RSS affiliated organisations as 'militant religious outfits' in 2018 did not persuade the Trump administration to question the Modi government for promoting Hindu majoritarianism. Trump remained unmoved on the gross violation of human rights in Kashmir despite bipartisan criticism of Indian actions by the US lawmakers.

With Trump gone, the honeymoon...