US not pressuring India to reopen the fighter jet bid: Blake

“Certainly for their own reason,if they decided that they need to reopen the bid,we will certainly welcome that opportunity and our companies would welcome that opportunity,” Blake said.

The United States had expressed its disappointment after India decided to exclude two US companies Lockheed Martin and Boeing from its multi-billion bidding process of its 100 plus fighter jets purchasing process.

“We look forward to with great interest other opportunities that will exist in the Indian defence market over the next several years USD 30 billion. American companies are keenly interested in expanding

their cooperation with India counterpart co-development,co-production type of activities.

This I think,will be an exciting area of co-operation,” Blake said.

Responding to questions,Blake said the US is not concerned in lagging behind countries like France and Russia to get bids for nuclear power plants in India.

“We do not have any concerns about losing out to the French and the Russians. We think there are quite important opportunities for American companies still,” he said in response to a question.

Blake also noted that nothing about the new enrichment and reprocessing transfer restrictions that were recently agreed to by the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) members will in any way distract from India-US nuclear cooperation.

“Two reactor sites have been set aside for the American companies Gujarat and in Andhra Pradesh. We are happy that the Indian Government remains very committed to the commitments that it made after President (Barack) Obama’s important visit to India last November,” he said,adding that the US look’s specifically to India’s ratification of the convention of supplementary compensation and to moving forward to some of the technical aspects and assurances.

Blake also noted that nothing about the new enrichment and reprocessing transfer restrictions that were recently agreed to by the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) members will in any way distract from India-US nuclear cooperation.

According to the US official there is great interest in the United States on the part of its business community to expand both investment and trade with their partners in India.

“There has already been tremendous expansion of trade and investment between our two countries over the last 10 years and we expect that it will continue as India becomes the third largest economy in the world by the year 2030,” he said.

“Our companies are hoping that the Indian Parliament and the Indian government would take action to reduce some of the limits on foreign direct investments in areas such as retail,that would provide huge new opportunities for our companies and help India both to increase the level of foreign investment but also to increase the level of jobs in India and also to lower prices of things like food which are of increasing concerns of Indian consumers.

I think that’s win-win for both countries,” Blake said.