PRESIDENT Ferdinand Marcos Jr. left Monday morning for a five-day state visit to India, where he is set to meet with Indian leaders led by President Droupadi Murmu and Prime Minister Narendra Modi to pursue stronger bilateral ties and more areas of cooperation between Manila and New Delhi.
Accompanied by First Lady Lisa Araneta-Marcos and Foreign Affairs Secretary Ma. Teresa Lazaro, the president departed from the Villamor Airbase at 10:44 am, and is expected to arrive in India between 6 and 7 pm tonight.
The president named Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin, Agrarian Reform Secretary Conrado Estrella III and Education Secretary Sonny Angara as caretakers to oversee the daily operations of the Office of the President while he is abroad.
Marcos is expected to discuss with Indian leaders closer cooperation in terms of the economy, defense and security, politics, trade and investment, and how to further invigorate people-to-people exchanges between the two nations, as well as pursue more investment opportunities with India’s business leaders.
He is also scheduled to meet with the Filipino community in New Delhi, as well as address the Observer Research Foundation to talk about the country’s foreign policies.
This is Marcos’s first visit to India and the first state visit of a Philippine president to India since the state visit of then president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in October 2007. The last visit of a Philippine president to India was by then president Rodrigo Duterte in January 2017, when he embarked on an official visit to attend the 25th Association of Southeast Asian Nation (Asean)-India Summit.
