Dubya’s latest budget virtually ends foreign aid to India. This is less dramatic than it sounds because the shift has been underway for some time. But it’s still as big a milestone as a teenager moving out of the house and paying his own way:

The United States has decided to end all bilateral financial aid to ‘rising’ India, following the country’s economic surge… With an economy that is growing at over 8 per cent, India had become a donor country, US AID Administrator Randall Tobias said, citing New Delhi’s $ 50 million aid to Afghanistan…

The Bush administration last week whittled down its already paltry $ 124.9 million aid in 2006 to a measly $ 81 million for the coming fiscal [year]… that downsized funding “will be used for the eventual orderly close out of US Agency of International Development’s programme in India…

… [U.S. aid peaked] in 1960 when Washington gave $ 1.6. billion, 92 per cent of it as food aid… US aid helped establish eight agricultural universities across India, and more famously, two IITs — in Kanpur and Kharagpur - and 14 regional engineering colleges… [Link]

Meanwhile, Pakistan and Israel get more fighter jets:

Crucial US South Asian allies Afghanistan and Pakistan would see increases in aid under the proposed budget that President George W Bush introduced on Monday…

The administration is recommending an increase in funds to Afghanistan from $968 million in the last budget to slightly more than $1 billion to pay for programs for drug eradication and job training programmes. Pakistan’s aid would increase to $785 million from $499 million. The figure would include a proposed $300 million in military aid aimed in part at helping Pakistan fight terrorism.

Under long-standing plans, military aid to Israel for 2008 will be $2.4 billion, and Egypt will receive $1.7 billion. [Link]