India mother of democracy, model of diversity: PM at I-day with US lawmakers in audience

India is a mother of democracy and a model of diversity, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on the occasion of the country’s 77th Independence Day, with two lawmakers from the United States in the audience.

“India is a mother of democracy; India is also a model of diversity,” Modi said as he addressed the nation from the rampart of the Red Fort in Delhi. “There are several languages, several dialects, various costumes, and diversity. We have to move forward taking all along.”

A bipartisan delegation of the US Congress – comprising Ro Khanna of the Democratic Party and Michael Waltz of the Republican Party – is currently on a tour to India. The two members of the US House of Representatives attended the ceremony to mark the Independence Day of India at the Red Fort in the national capital.

With the two visiting US lawmakers and the diplomats of the many foreign nations based in New Delhi in the audience, the prime minister referred to the diversity and democracy in India, apparently to send out a message to his critics abroad.

“We are fortunate that we have inherited certain things from our ancestors and even the present era has created certain other things,” the prime minister said on Tuesday. “Today we have demography; we have democracy; we have diversity. This trinity of demography, democracy and diversity has the potential to fulfil every dream of India.”

Khanna, himself, had a meeting with some human rights activists before commencing his visit to India. The US lawmakers purportedly told them that he would raise the issues related to human rights during his visit to India. “We (India and the US) must continue to strive to make progress and build our partnership based on our shared founding values of democracy, freedom of the press and assembly, and human rights,” a press release issued by his office quoted him saying before leaving for Mumbai and New Delhi. He also told a TV channel in New Delhi that both India and the US were not perfect democracies and were striving to be ones. He also said that it was important for two friendly nations to have candid conversations on the strength and pluralistic nature of their democracies.

Modi’s spectacular state visit and his meetings with Joe Biden on June 22 last came under a bit of a shadow as 75 Democrat members of the American Congress wrote to the US president requesting him to convey concerns over reports of growing religious intolerance, shrinking of political space, curbs on freedom of the press and erosion of human rights in India. At least six US lawmakers had also boycotted the prime minister’s address to a joint sitting of the US Congress – alleging repression of religious minorities during his tenure at the top office in New Delhi.

Even as Biden hosted Modi at the White House in Washington DC, former US president Barack Obama said during an interview with CNN that if the rights of the minority Muslims in India were not protected, the country might someday start to pull apart. He had even suggested that the issue of protection of minority Muslims in Hindu-majority India was worth mentioning if the president of the US had a meeting with the prime minister of India.

Modi did not directly respond to Obama, but the former US president did draw flak from the ruling BJP’s leaders in India, including heavyweights like union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma.

A journalist of Wall Street Journal, Sabrina Siddiqui, was also at the receiving end of a vitriolic campaign on social media platforms as she had asked a question to the prime minister during his joint press conference with the US president at the White House on June 22 about the state of democracy and religious freedom in India. The online harassment of the journalist already drew flak from the White House.