India Will Succeed As Long As It Is Not Splintered Along Religious Lines: Obama

"And nowhere is it more important than in India. Nowhere is it going to be more necessary for that foundational value to be upheld," he said.

Underlining the factors that unify both the countries, Obama said "our diversity is our strength" and cautioned that both India and the US have to be on guard against divisive efforts along sectarian lines or any other lines.

"...If we do that well and if America shows itself as example of its diversity and the capacity to live and work together in common effort and common purpose and if India as massive as it is with so much diversity, so many differences, is able to continuously reaffirm its democracy so that is an example for every other country.

That's what makes us world leaders. Not just the size of our economies or the number of weapons we have but our ability to show the way and how we work together," he said.

The US President picked Indian heroes like actor Shah Rukh Khan and sports icons like Milkha Singh and Mary Kom and Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi to make a point that courage and humanitarian values unify both the nations.

"By what Dr King (Martin Luther King Jr) called content of our character rather than the colour of our skin or the manner in which we worship our god. In both our countries, in India and Amercia, our diversity is our strength," he said.

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