Narendra Modi’s swift tour of three countries in nine days with earned goodies in his bag was remarkable. The defence deal in France and the uranium flow into the country from Canada was something that Modi can boost about. However, both deals seem to have been beneficial to the source countries. These were significant besides the other agreements signed on this trip.
Modi emphasized that the diaspora Indians in these countries, particularly in Canada, were a bridge between Canada and India. He also emphasized that Canada and India shared “special relationship.” No doubt there were protests in Toronto and Vancouver by groups, Modi shared a special camaraderie with Canada PM Stephen Harper, who seemed to have been bitten by the Vibrant Gujarat hub and Modi’s ultra-conservative initiatives and vision.
Harper obviously must be pleased to host Modi, who seems to have taken a leaf out of Harper’s book on governance. Harper has taken Canada on to the extreme right in the years since he came to power in 2006. It is said that he’s in the process of dismantling Canada of all its democratic norms and principles. His government is known to be autocratic and Harper himself hates dissent. He is bent on destroying any opposition to him, both within the party and outside, and his rage is particularly against the Liberals, which is like India’s Congress party. Never does he pass up on an opportunity to hit out at Liberals for what it did in their terms of office, just as Modi is doing with blaming Congress for all the ills that India is facing.
Harper came to power on the promise of “change” but he’s going on the same road that Liberals took. Many U-turns and unfulfilled promises have been pointed out in his two terms and he is in the campaign mode, if one checks his recent budget with reduced taxes for business and other benefits to people so as to balance the budget, as the general election is due in October.
The Modi visit may benefit Harper with getting more Indo-Canadian votes. The PC have made inroads in the Indo-Canadian community as some MPs in the current parliament testify. It has obviously created some sort of fear in the Liberals, who seem to be losing political ground in this community. At present, there are seven Indo-Canadian MPs, out of which six are from PC, in the 323-seat House of Commons.
Modi and his BJP has been slamming the media by remaking that it displays a Congress bias, just as Harper has ignored the media and blasts those unfavorable to the Progressive Conservative (PC) party with the “Liberal bias” brush. Harper had a fall-out with the Reform Party leader Preston Manning and he has shown the door to many close Reformers and top Tory members after the merger of Alliance, a breakaway party from the Reform, with the PC. Harper tolerates nobody and is largely known to have his own way. Modi has similar traits, and one can check Modi’s rule in Gujarat and his time till today in Delhi.
Billed as a Rockstar, Modi didn’t fail to impress his Canadian supporters. The hype and hoopla surrounding his visit was expected, since his impact on the diaspora Indians in the US with his presence at Madison Square Garden. Canada may have not publicly said that it has banned Modi on visiting the country following the Gujarat riots, just as US did, but it seems that was plausible, as some media reported. Today, Canada courts India for Canada believes India is a good market. However, if one looks back especially the trip, called Team Canada, by Jean Chretien, with top Canadian CEOs and businessmen, one must be wary of Canada investment going into India. Deals worth $3.4 billion were signed, but most of them were Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), out of which few came to fruition.
Economic pundits have noted that Canada is headed for economic downtown and there’s a hint of recession coming over North America. Modi’s mantra of Make in India could not be favorably applicable to Canada whose manufacturing sector, as The Globe and Mail noted, is “depressing.” The PR gimmick used by Modi to win friends and businesses is no doubt the work of an ad agency. The message, however, is tantalizing but it’s unlikely to act as an instant magnet, giving the conditions prevailing in many countries. Recently, Toyata Canada has moved its Corolla manufacturing unit to Mexico.
Modi’s sales pitch appeals to the ears but given the situation in India it’s likely that foreign countries will line up to set up shops in India. The social upheaval in the country is one of negative factors, besides other things. Modi’s vision for this Make in India is shaped by an ad agency, just as India Shining was. It’s all sizzle but no steak. Sorry, to mention steak with the beef ban ruling over India and has those beef-eating communities up in arms. Though Barack Obama has made a pointed reference to the communal tensions in India, he has also been diplomatic by giving Modi a tribute piece in Time magazine. It’s geo-politics at work here.
Keeping global politics aside, the regional politics, in particular involving Goa, looks murky. Goa is seen in a bad light for its bad policing. It can’t catch its former minister Mickky Pacheco, convicted by the court, in the cat-and-mouse parade currently going on. It shames the government and the state. The government machinery has so far failed to nab the rapist in the Vasco rape case that happened a long time ago. This confounds the poor image of Goa as that a place where drugs and rapes abound. Goa reflects what is happening to women in India, battered from misogynist BJP leaders, honour-killing and rising number of rapes.
Amidst these government lapses, we have a minister’s wife utter rubbish and blacken Goa’s face. For centuries, Goa’s syncretic culture has been held as a mirror to Goa’s harmonious social heritage. To provoke the Hindus not to send their children to convent schools is to rock Goa’s stable communal situation. It was a mischievous song by this Lata (wife of minister Deepak Dhavalikar) and it was flatly refuted by her brother-in-law Ramkrishna Sudin Dhavalikar, the PWD minister. That both brothers, belonging to the once-powerful ruling MGP, are at different wavelengths on this issue is bit surprising, though the fact is that Sudin, earlier on, had advised girls not to sport short dresses in pubs and not be seen in bikinis on beaches. Instead of seeking to turn MGP around and make it what is was decades ago, they are showing themselves as people whose minds are locked in the 18th century.
The foot-in-the-mouth disease among the BJP is seen also at the Centre. No day passes without some minister making a stupid statement against a minority community or giving India’s secular framework a robust shake. For all his newly-acquired global reach and admiration in some quarters, Modi has failed in his domestic front by not showing his authority to rein in some of the uninhibited hotheads in the Parivar family from uttering words that harm the pluralistic nature of the country.
Both Canada and India harped on the pluralistic nature of their countries, but each country has its peculiar problems – the minority issue in India and the Aboriginal issue in Canada. If India’s pluralistic society is under siege because of the RSS and VHP overweight on the existing political climate, overt and covert racism undermines Canadian unity.
The great Canadian media guru, Marshal McLuhan said, “The Medium is the Message.” Modi must rectify the medium that’s India before his message of “Make in India” is swallowed by foreign countries.
(Eugene Correia is a senior journalist.)
