Bar a public skirmish over climate change, Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, hardly put a foot wrong during her five-day visit to India. She left on Monday night with defence, space and nuclear power agreements in the bag and smiles all round about the possibilities that lay before two of the world’s largest democracies.

“A wonderful visit from a friend,” is how Shashi Tharoor, India’s junior foreign minister and former United Nations diplomat, summed it up as his government basked in Mrs Clinton’s message of global partnership.