Tim Cook is being treated as virtual rock star while he visits India on his first trip.

Keeping Cook’s bodyguards busy as the Apple Inc. chief executive officer toured the city’s most famous temple, the paparazzi have tailed him since he began the visit Wednesday in the financial capital Mumbai.

“I’m here to learn,” was all Cook said when he was ambushed by reporters who had waited hours in sweltering heat outside the Taj Mahal hotel in Mumbai.

Before jetting off to another city in the country to watch a cricket match, Tim Cook flew to Hyderabad from Mumbai on Thursday to open a development center along with a prominent politician from India. In a manner that more suits a rock star, just about every step that Cook has taken has been reported, photographed and tweeted.

Earlier while in Mumbai, Cook met Tata Group Chairman Cyrus Mistry, whose sprawling conglomerate includes stores selling iPhones, spent time with Anant Ambani — son of India’s richest man Mukesh Ambani and attended a dinner in Mumbai hosted by Bollywood film star Shah Rukh Khan and attended by many of the film stars of Bollywood. He also met the top brass for Vodafone Group Plc in India.

But his much awaited and anticipated meeting with Prime Minister Modi is under covers.

Cook may meet Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and he is expected in New Delhi as early as Friday. It should be noted that his meeting with Modi assumes importance as the Apple’s application to open retail stores in Asia’s third-largest economy is currently being reviewed by the administration of the country.

Apple, Samsung Electronics Co. and other vendors are keen to sell to India’s middle class, which is projected to quadruple to 200 million by 2020. China has lost its appeal somewhat as China’s market becomes more saturated and people across the globe are upgrading their smartphones less frequently.

According to World Bank data, a large chunk of people in India live on less than $3.10 a day and hence the challenge for Apple is that its products are beyond the reach of many in India.

Apple wants to lower the price of devices over time in India, sell pre-owned iPhones refurbished in the country and introduce Apple Pay, Cook said in an interview with the local NDTV channel that aired on Friday.

Apple’s request to import and sell refurbished iPhones to the world’s second largest mobile population had been rejected by India, a telecommunications ministry official said on May 3.

India is a market where most phones aren’t subsidized by carriers through calling plans and are bought outright. According to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Simon Chan, Apple doesn’t feature in the top 10 in terms of smartphone market share in the South Asian nation.

Apple is planning a long presence in India, Cook said in the television interview.

“We are putting enormous energy here,” he said. “We are not here for a quarter or two quarters or the next year or the next year, we are here for a 1,000 years.”

(Adapted from Bloomberg)

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