Tweet
Modi should apply for American visa
Modi should apply for American visa - Indian Punchline
India’s political and media culture has sunk to a pathetically low point. The brouhaha over the recent US Congressional Research Service [CRS] report’s references to Gujrat chief minister Narendra Modi makes it out to be that the CRS is the fountainhead of wisdom on international politics. Which it is not. I have had occasions to go through the CRS reports over the years and I have found them to be mostly ‘low grade’ stuff. At least, if you go through the reports on Russia or Afghanistan or Pakistan, you’d know what I mean.
Put plainly, they are mostly pedestrian in quality and very often vacuous and sweeping in their conclusions and they indeed show up the inexperience (and innocence) of the raw hands who produce them regarding complex international situations in regions and faraway lands they know little about. The well-informed Americans would know this much that 3 years is a long time in politics and no one in his senses can make a prediction about the vagaries of Indian politics at such an early stage — that BJP is going to be a ‘formidable challenger’ to the Congress, blah, blah.
I am surprised that Modi took the CRS report seriously enough to start twitting amidst all the weighty thoughts on his mind over the upcoming 3-day fast. He usually manages to convey the impression of being cool as cucumber and of being above worldly emotions of flattery or condemnation. The media persons from India on the American ‘beat’ could and should have given a gentle corrective to Modi, advising the doughty politican not to waste precious time over the trivial stuff of a CRS report. But they too seem to have played along.
The funny thing is that some Indians got the CRS mixed up with the US government. The CRS report on Modi is taken to be in sync with the official US opinion. As WikiLeak cables show, on the contrary, US diplomats are of the highest calibre professionally. (I wish someday India would have such a top-notch diplomatic service.) And it is inconceivable that the Us diplomats assigned to Delhi would be unaware of the Indian realities and the quicksands of Indian politics. They would surely know that coalition politics in India are full of snake pits, what with the vaulting ambitions of so many prima donnas of all ages longing for the prime ministerial job in Delhi in 2014. On the whole, the US diplomatic cables show the Indian politician in very poor light.
The best way Modi could check out on the CRS’ credibility might be by applying for a US visa. The Americans, like any big power, are great time-servers and if they have the slightest inkling that Modi is on an inexorable march toward Raisina Hill in 2014, they would find a way to take him out of their visa ‘blacklist’.
The entire CRS-Mody saga only goes to show how little Indians have changed, despite their country’s globalisation and its acknowledged status as an emerging power, in their cringing desire for the West’s recognition.It seems only the other day that the then US assistant secretary of state Robin Raphael bragged 15 years ago that she needed hardly 3 minutes to raise dust — create a ruckus — in Delhi. In these times of twitter, Indians need only 3 seconds to get all worked up.
Posted in Politics.
Tagged with Narendra Modi.
By M K Bhadrakumar – September 15, 2011
Modi should apply for American visa - Indian Punchline
India’s political and media culture has sunk to a pathetically low point. The brouhaha over the recent US Congressional Research Service [CRS] report’s references to Gujrat chief minister Narendra Modi makes it out to be that the CRS is the fountainhead of wisdom on international politics. Which it is not. I have had occasions to go through the CRS reports over the years and I have found them to be mostly ‘low grade’ stuff. At least, if you go through the reports on Russia or Afghanistan or Pakistan, you’d know what I mean.
Put plainly, they are mostly pedestrian in quality and very often vacuous and sweeping in their conclusions and they indeed show up the inexperience (and innocence) of the raw hands who produce them regarding complex international situations in regions and faraway lands they know little about. The well-informed Americans would know this much that 3 years is a long time in politics and no one in his senses can make a prediction about the vagaries of Indian politics at such an early stage — that BJP is going to be a ‘formidable challenger’ to the Congress, blah, blah.
I am surprised that Modi took the CRS report seriously enough to start twitting amidst all the weighty thoughts on his mind over the upcoming 3-day fast. He usually manages to convey the impression of being cool as cucumber and of being above worldly emotions of flattery or condemnation. The media persons from India on the American ‘beat’ could and should have given a gentle corrective to Modi, advising the doughty politican not to waste precious time over the trivial stuff of a CRS report. But they too seem to have played along.
The funny thing is that some Indians got the CRS mixed up with the US government. The CRS report on Modi is taken to be in sync with the official US opinion. As WikiLeak cables show, on the contrary, US diplomats are of the highest calibre professionally. (I wish someday India would have such a top-notch diplomatic service.) And it is inconceivable that the Us diplomats assigned to Delhi would be unaware of the Indian realities and the quicksands of Indian politics. They would surely know that coalition politics in India are full of snake pits, what with the vaulting ambitions of so many prima donnas of all ages longing for the prime ministerial job in Delhi in 2014. On the whole, the US diplomatic cables show the Indian politician in very poor light.
The best way Modi could check out on the CRS’ credibility might be by applying for a US visa. The Americans, like any big power, are great time-servers and if they have the slightest inkling that Modi is on an inexorable march toward Raisina Hill in 2014, they would find a way to take him out of their visa ‘blacklist’.
The entire CRS-Mody saga only goes to show how little Indians have changed, despite their country’s globalisation and its acknowledged status as an emerging power, in their cringing desire for the West’s recognition.It seems only the other day that the then US assistant secretary of state Robin Raphael bragged 15 years ago that she needed hardly 3 minutes to raise dust — create a ruckus — in Delhi. In these times of twitter, Indians need only 3 seconds to get all worked up.
Posted in Politics.
Tagged with Narendra Modi.
By M K Bhadrakumar – September 15, 2011