Mumbai, July 18 - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Saturday that the US wanted 'new and promising relations' with India as she began a five-day visit to the country by mourning the victims of the Mumbai terror attack.

Clinton, who arrived here late Friday to step up economic and strategic ties between the US and India, met some of the survivors of the terrorist savagery and then described continuing global terrorism as 'ruthless and nihilistic' that needed to be stopped.

Her first major engagement was meeting select Indian business leaders on issues like energy security, agriculture, global financial crisis and also climate change. She said she had 'exciting and fruitful' discussions.

The meeting was organised by Tata group chairman Ratan Naval Tata. Also present were Reliance group's Mukesh Ambani, ICICI Bank's Chanda Kochhar, Nicholas Piramal's Swati Piramal, Godrej group's Adi Godrej and Mahindra and Mahindra's Anand Mahindra.

'We have entered into new and promising era of cooperation between our two countries,' said Clinton during a brief interaction with the media later.

Clinton also said that she hoped to see a number of pacts reached between the US and India in areas ranging from energy to agriculture, including the supply of sophisticated defence equipment to the Indian armed forces.

Clinton is staying at the luxurious Taj Palace and Tower Hotel, close to the Gateway of India and one of the places terrorists from Pakistan raided and slaughtered innocent people, foreigners included.

The Secretary of State was given a tour of the now renovated hotel by Karimbir Kang, its general manager whose wife and two children were slain by terrorists as they went from room to room shooting and hurling grenades.

She said she was deeply touched to meet the staff of both the Taj and the nearby Oberoi-Triden Hotel who faced the brunt of the terrorists till they were killed by Indian commandos after about 60 hours.

'The great men and women who worked in this hotel and elsewhere in the city... (facing) senseless violence and helped save lives ... they deserve our gratitude.'

Referring to Friday's bombings in Jakarta, Clinton said it was a 'painful reminder (that terrorism) is global, it is ruthless, it is nihilistic, and it must be stopped'.