United States President Joe Biden is unlikely to travel to India to attend Republic Day celebrations as the Chief Guest next month, several media reports said on Tuesday, 12 December.
Quoting people familiar with the matter, Hindustan Times reported that New Delhi is also looking at alternative dates for the QUAD Summit, which was also slated to be held in January 2024. Moreover, India also faces the task of finding another guest with just more than a month left for the Republic Day event.
US Ambassador to India Eric Garcetti had said in September that Prime Minister Narendra Modi invited Biden to be the Chief Guest for the Republic Day celebrations.
Biden's visit was expected to be the largest of recent India visits by US officials like Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, who visited India for the '2+2' ministerial dialogue.
Moreover, US Principal Deputy NSA Jonathan Finer visited India last week and FBI Director Christopher Wray is currently on a three-day visit to New Delhi.
More importantly, it was coming just weeks after an indictment confirmed that US law enforcement foiled a conspiracy to assassinate Sikhs for Justice founder Pannun on US soil, with the attorney's office filing charges against an Indian national who, along with a purported Indian government staffer, allegedly conspired to kill Pannun in June 2023.
In May this year, PM Modi had announced that India will host the Quad leaders summit in 2024, and the meet was expected to take place close to 27 January if the US President had accepted the invite. Now, sources say that the summit will likely be held in the second half of 2024.
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