How Indira Gandhi’s ‘left turn’ brought India-US ties under pressure

NOTE: This is Part III of an ongoing series on the history of India-US relations. In Part I, we looked at the historic ties between the two countries before formal diplomatic relations were established in 1947. The second part looked at bilateral ties under Jawaharlal Nehru. You can read them here and here. The year 1966 was an inflection point for India in more ways than one. Lal Bahadur Shastri, who had succeeded the county first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, died midway through his term. Indira Gandhi, then widely dismissed as a political lightweight, took over as Prime Minister. The…