US President Joe Biden on Sunday made it clear that the assistance offered by his administration to India to combat Covid-19 is in exchange for India’s aid earlier. He added the US was “determined” to help India, seeking to push back on narrative that his administration was late to come to India’s rescue.“Just as India sent assistance to the United States as our hospitals were strained early in the pandemic, we are determined to help India in its time of need,” Biden wrote in a tweet Sunday, re-tweeting a post from his National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, who announced the assistance after a phone call with his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval.People familiar with the discussions leading up to the announcement on both sides echoed the framing of the assistance as a gesture between partners, with the US returning the favour this time.Biden did not specify in the tweet, but he meant the assistance announced by his administration Sunday was similar in nature — and reciprocal — to the lifting of an export ban by India to release a consignment of hydroxychloroquine by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in April last year at the personal urging of President Donald Trump.
