•Hello and welcome to Walk the Talk. I’m at the US embassy in Delhi and my guest is Ambassador David Mulford, completing what should be the diplomatic equivalent of a home run, isn’t it?

Five years

•And what kind of five years, incredible five years?

It’s been an incredible five years. Quite beyond any expectations I had when I arrived, although it has been a very, very satisfying period of time

•You know, when you came in, a lot of us said that India and US and their relationship had had forty lost years.....these five years have made up for some of that.

Well, I think it has, and I think a lot of the credit goes to George Bush who, early in his first administration had identified the US-India strategic relationship as a key objective, and he has followed through on that. That was the direction under which I came, and that has been the priority during these past five years.

•It’s very interesting, it’s also been 50 years of this building I believe, that’s why you had this exhibition, and you can see the difference in mood and time...from Nehru to Mrs. Gandhi and then on to Dr Manmohan Singh. But, Ambassador, many things have been achieved, some have not been achieved, during these five years — the nuclear deal for example, a remarkable thing that happened. But would you agree that the biggest achievement (is) the complete de-hyphenating of US’s relationships in South Asia?

... contd.