I recognize the United States is a superpower. It has various interests. It has to balance various things.

As the largest and most developed democracies of Asia (India and Japan), we have a mutual stake in each other's progress and prosperity.

I have always regard nonalignment as a statement that India's policies, foreign policy will be guided by what I describe as enlightened national interest. That we will make judgments on an independent basis, with the sole concern being what is enlightened India's national interest. In that sense, nonalignment remains as relevant today as it was in the early 1950s.

The Indian economy grew at 5.5 percent, but if you look at the last 30 years - for example, 1960 to 1985 - the progress made by East Asian countries was phenomenal. In a single generation they had been able to transform the character of their economy. They were able to get rid of chronic poverty.

Let me say that I think the economic history of the last 150 years clearly shows that if you want to industrialize a country in a short period, let us say 20 years, and you don't have a well-developed private sector, entrepreneurial class, then central planning is important.

I think there are enormous possibilities. And today there are no I think barriers to increased cooperation with India and the United States.

We should put more money in health. We should put more money in devising credible social safety nets for the poor.