Permanent seat in the UN: Obama hands India the ticket

New Delhi: Soon after a successful round of talks with prime minister Manmohan Singh on defining a Indo-US partnership for the years and decades ahead, US president Barack Obama backed India's claims for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.

The announcement, made before a joint session of the two houses of Parliament in the historic Central Hall of Parliament marks a significant recognition of India as an emergent power.

It is also, possibly, the last significant endorsement that Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh will require to cement the unqualified success of his policy to make a break with the past and cement a strategic relationship with the United States – a process he began with previous president George W Bush. For a foreign policy establishment that has been working strenuously to pole vault India into the big league of world politics - a position that for long India has aspired to - the endorsement would also come as a watershed moment.

"The just and sustainable international order that America seeks includes a United Nations that is efficient, effective, credible and legitimate," Obama said in his speech.

"That is why I can say today -- in the years ahead, I look forward to a reformed UN Security Council that includes India as a permanent member," he added.

Today is the last day of president Obama's three-day long tour of the country.