The national capital is busy with arrangements for one of the biggest events of the year, the G20 summit, where foreign dignitaries from across the world are going to visit Indian territories and embrace how beautiful the Indian lands are! Imagine they step into the ‘land of gems’, which is now a mirror of the ‘land of inhuman riots’. We are talking about our Northeastern neighbour, Manipur, which has been constantly burning for a few months. Our beloved PM, who is famous for having world tours and maintaining healthy global ties, didn’t get time to visit his own land, even after witnessing such terrible acts of violence.
What if the G20 is held in Manipur? Will they still praise India as a sovereign country? Will they still appreciate India as the fastest-growing economy with a plethora of economic violence? We doubt!
Utter importance is given to the security and hospitality of foreign diplomats. From star hotels to trained commandos, the central government is leaving no stone unturned to greet foreign dignitaries. Well, this is great, as India truly believes in the policy of ‘Atithi Devo Bhav’; but aren’t the voters and taxpayers of this nation, who are actually running the biggest democracy of the world, deserve similar attention from the PM of the country, mainly when the situation is as sensitive as in Manipur, which is witnessing horrible shreds of evidence of communal violence?
It’s just 6 months back that Manipur hosted the famous B20 summit of the G20 forum, where delegates from 23 countries participated. The three-day meeting discussed opportunities for multilateral business partnerships in ICT, tourism, healthcare and handlooms, and now the state is burning in loops, with one after another outbreak of violence.
In February, before concluding the three-day meeting, the delegates visited Ima Keithel, the iconic all-women-run market in the heart of the capital city, and just after a few months, in the deadly heat of June, ‘Imas’, or ‘mothers’ (elderly women traders) arrived in Delhi, requesting that they would only leave after the Prime Minister address the current horrific situation in Manipur and present a concrete solution. It’s heartbreaking to witness how these Imas, aka the Manipur women, criticise the government of India’s “divisive” tactics and strongly confront Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s silence on Manipur.
How would the PM answer if the G20 is held in violent Manipur? It seems that if he hasn’t said anything about Manipur, it’s because the consultation process is still ongoing. It appears that his professional public relations team has failed to craft a compelling statement for him that will mislead the public. If G20 be held in Manipur, the members will witness how the government is ignoring such a sensitive issue and addressing election meetings in Madhya Pradesh!
The president of the United States paid us a visit in 2020. It was Trump at the time. And, while he was in Delhi, the capital, there was terrible violence, with mobs supported by the ruling party, the BJP. As a result, we believe our government will be fine with some criticism from international media regarding covering the G-20. Do you think this was Bharat’s goal as a superpower?
Conclusion.
At the very outset, all the collective efforts to graft a global statesman persona around the Honorable Prime Minister will get neutralised if the noises in Manipur don’t settle humanly. If the G20 be held in Manipur, the foreign dignitaries will witness how the government is ignoring the spate of religious and ethnic clashes. Hence, this will unravel how India’s efforts to showcase it as an Asian superpower at the G20 are not as powerful as it sounds because no country can become a world leader if it is damaged on its own soil.
Prime Minister Modi wants to show the world that he is the leader of a united, democratic country that is a growing powerhouse ahead of the G-20 conference. However, when incidences of religious violence continue to make worldwide news and the central government blatantly ignores the issue, it is time to call his story into question. We doubt that if the G20 is held in Manipur, all these things will cast a shadow on the government’s administrative abilities, Bharat’s majoritarian (inaudible) politics and the PM’s ability to keep India together.
