With an embrace, laughter and a shared car ride, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Russian president, Vla­di­mir Putin, seemed to send a clear message to the United States of America and Europe: their attempts to force New Delhi to weaken ties with Moscow will not succeed. Mr Modi and Mr Putin met in Tianjin, China, on the margins of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit against the backdrop of the imposition of 50% tariffs on Indian goods — half of that as penalty for Indian purchases of Russian oil — by the US president, Donald Trump. In recent days, members of Mr Trump’s administration and the US president’s advisers have been using increasingly inflammatory rhetoric against New Delhi, accusing India of effectively financing Russia’s war on Ukraine and suggesting that the tariff rate would be halved if Mr Modi plays ball. Monday’s optics represented a public rebuff to those pressure tactics as Mr Modi and Mr Putin also huddled for a chat with the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, exchanging banter. The Indian prime minister described his interactions with Mr Putin as insightful and invited him to visit India in December — at a time when an International Criminal Court warrant means that the Russian leader cannot safely travel to most other parts of the world.

Yet the meeting with Mr Putin was also an act of artful diplomacy. Mr Modi had spoken with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, on the phone just two days earlier. In his meeting with Mr Putin, Mr Modi stressed India’s desire for an early end to the war in Ukraine through constructive dialogue between Moscow and Kyiv. According to Mr Zelensky — there is no reason to disbelieve him — Mr Modi told him that India was ready to carry Kyiv’s messages to Mr Putin in the absence of direct talks between the Russian and the Ukrainian leaders. In other words, India has made it clear that it remains committed to helping with diplomacy between Russia and Ukraine — but not in a manner of Washington’s choosing. That approach will not be easy to stick to if the US decides to further use economic warfare or other tools at its disposal as a superpower to hurt India. New Delhi has no option but to pursue ties on the premise that the US will eventually recognise the folly of pushing India away. If it does not, then the relationship is not worth sacrificing other ties for.