Obama recalls trip to India, personal friendship with Modi

Washington: India's new ambassador to the US, Arun Kumar Singh formally presented his credentials to President Barrack Obama at a ceremony in his Oval Office at the White House.

Obama warmly welcomed Singh back to Washington and wished him success in his new responsibilities as India's envoy to the US.

He fondly recalled his visit to India in January and personal friendship with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Singh, in turn, conveyed warm greetings from President Pranab Mukherjee and Modi to him and First Lady Michelle Obama.

Singh said that he was committed to work towards making the India-US strategic partnership global in outlook, strategic in content and transformative for India's development, as decided by the leaders of the two countries in the summits held in September 2014 and January 2015.

Singh was first of the seven new ambassadors to present his credentials at the traditional ceremony that marks the formal beginning of an ambassador's service in Washington.

Singh, who takes the place of S Jaishankar following the latter's elevation as foreign secretary in January, had assumed his new assignment April 30 after presenting a copy of the credentials to the State Department

He served as India's ambassador to France from April, 2013 to April, 2015. Before that Singh served as India's ambassador to Israel from April 2005 to September, 2008 and then deputy chief of mission in Washington from Oct 2008 to April 2013.

He served in the Indian mission at Moscow again as counsellor/minister from 1997-2000.

During his assignment in Delhi from 2000-2005, he served in the capacity of joint secretary dealing first with the UN policy, and then Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran divisions at the external affairs ministry.

Singh has also served at India's Permanent Mission to the UN in New York from 1993-1997 as counsellor and handled multilateral social and economic negotiations.

Singh speaks Russian and Japanese and has some knowledge of French and Hebrew. He is married to Maina Chawla Singh. They have one daughter.

Singh joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1979 after completing his Masters degree in Economics from Delhi University and teaching at the university for two years.