🎭 Political Theatre | Of old friendships and cold shoulders

Good morning readers and welcome to another edition of DH’s political theatre. This week a heavy silence hung above the country as families of those who perished in the tragic crash of AI171 waited in sorrow to receive the remains of their family members. There were many among this crowd who had tinges of hope that those who were termed ‘missing’ will be found somewhere out there. Sadly, this wasn’t the case for many as DNA testing proved that the worst had come true. 

The aftermath of the crash saw an outpouring of grief and rage at the cruel tragedy which snatched the lives of more than 200 people in a single devastating moment.  As India grapples with the calamity that had befallen, let's also turn our attention to events that dominated the political arena this week:

C-ing the world in 4 days  

This week Prime Minister Narendra Modi embarked on an expedition beginning with Cyprus. In his meeting with President Nikos Christodoulides, he promised to uphold Cyprus’ independence. By promising their recognition, and Canada ignited by the murder of Khalistani Sikh extremist Hardeep Singh Nijjar, both the countries have decided to respect each other and rebuild their relationship. In line with this, they have decided to return Indian and Canadian High Commissioners to Ottawa and New Delhi, respectively. 

Unfortunately, not all relationships are working. There seems to be a bit of snag in his burgeoning relationship with US President Donald Trump who too had come to attend the summit. But more on that later.

After attending the G7 summit, Modi made history by becoming the first Indian prime minister to visit Croatia. Here as well, the Indian prime minister held talks with Croatia’s leadership and aimed to boost ties.

Frosty relations up North 

PM Modi and Donald Trump’s warm relationship, which many believed was achieved due to the Indian Premier's huglomacy, has taken a bit of a tumble. While India made amends with one country in North America, icy winds slowly shifted to the other. 

Modi and Trump were supposed to meet on the sidelines of G7, but the US president decided to leave the summit early due to the conflict in the Middle East. Moreover, a very interesting guest was making an appearance at the White House: Pakistan Army Chief Asim Munir. 

But prior to this meeting, Modi had dialled Trump and reiterated that India has never accepted and will never accept mediation by any third party to settle issues with Pakistan. Unfortunately, Trump didn’t give any heed to Modi’s clarification and once again stated that he being a ‘harbinger’ of peace had brought forth a ceasefire between the two ‘warring’ nations.

Moreover, while meeting Pakistan’s latest Field Marshall, Trump expressed his desire to do trade with the country. This meeting has come as a huge blow to PM Modi as earlier the United States of America had publicly claimed that Pakistan was a ‘safe haven for terrorists’ and now it seems they are making some sort of an ‘alliance’, leaving India alone to tackle with its notorious neighbour and leaving Modi sans a friend.

Back home, the Congress party wasted no time in pointing out Modi’s flaws and criticising the ‘fantastic man’ (a term Trump recently called Modi). They said that Trump’s lunch with Munir was a "huge blow" to Indian diplomacy.

Of English egos and Hindi woes

Nothing sparks a political debate—which can percolate to the masses— quite like language, and this week stands testimony to that. The week began with a controversial move by the Maharashtra government to make ‘Hindi’ a mandatory 3rd language in schools. But, after receiving intense backlash from both the opposition and literary bodies, the government ‘amended’ its order by saying that Hindi will "generally" be the third language. 

Amongst the people involved in the backlash was Raj Thackeray, who was leading the chant. He asked what was the need to "impose" Hindi on students and appealed to schools in Maharashtra to foil the government's "hidden agenda to deliberately create a language divide".

While Maharashtra was grappling with such issues, Union Minister Amit Shah too dabbled in language politics, albeit with his own ‘dialect’. Maybe in a bid to appease the masses, the home minister made a contentious statement which left many people puzzled at a book launch event. He said ‘the time is not far that those speaking English in the country will start to feel ashamed’.

This statement invoked a backlash from the opposition, with many saying it showcases a "restrictive and narrow-minded" political view. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi too retaliated and said that BJP-RSS doesn't want the poor to learn English as it empowers them to ask questions.

Tharoor’s coup d'état? Tussle with Congress carries on 

While Congress was busy packing a punch at the BJP, they too got a shock when one of their own made it to the limelight for openly defying the leadership. Shashi Tharoor, the man who recently led a delegation to the US and several other countries in the Americas, admitted that he doesn’t toe the line of the ringmasters and does have a ‘difference of opinion’ with some colleagues in the party. 

This reaction comes on the heels of the Thiruvananthapuram MP claiming that his invitation got lost in the mail for the campaign at Nilambur by-poll in Kerala.

‘We were never apart’: Bharat milap

Maharashtra isn’t the only state privy to old family reunions. After Uddhav and Raj Thackeray's possible reunification, politicians from Rajasthan too followed suit. In a peculiar turn of events, Congress leaders Ashok Gehlot and Sachin Pilot have decided to let go of their feud and mend their differences 

Later on, Gehlot even feigned surprise and said, “When were we apart? We were never apart.” 

BJP, Congress at each other’s throats, again

In a move which BJP labelled as ‘minority appeasement’, the Karnataka government hiked the minority reservation in housing schemes from 10 to 15%. The party defended themselves against the naysayers by retailing, “Why do you smell political motives?”

But the BJP didn’t back down and said that Congress was snatching the rights of SCs, STs, OBCs and EWS.

In other news, the Tamil Nadu CM is at loggerheads with the Centre. M K Stalin made sharp remarks at the government for demanding additional evidence from archaeologist K Amarnath Ramakrishna on the Sangam Era site of Keeladi.

Ramakrishna was relieved from his role as Director (Antiquity) in the ASI and transferred to Greater Noida. This comes in the wake of him being asked to rework on his report of the first two phases of excavation in Keeladi.

DMK and the BJP are currently engaged in a tussle over the interpretation of findings from Keeladi excavation.

Stalin remarked that demanding of more information is a “blatant attack” on Tamil culture.

Iran puts Israel's Iron dome to test

A week after Israel launched a barrage of missiles at Iran and eliminated its military top brass along with many of its scientists who were involved with the country's nuclear programme, Iran decided it had had enough.

Under the stewardship of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the West Asian country appointed a new league of leaders and began retaliating with more missiles, including the Fattah-1 hypersonic ballistic missile, at its Jewish neighbour. 

These missiles were able to pose a challenge to Israel’s Iron dome system and also succeeded in striking a hospital in Beersheba. This attack on the hospital came as a grave insult to Israel who vowed to eliminate Khamenei at all costs.

In this midst of all this tension, India too had its worries. Many people who were stranded in the two 'warring' nations had to brought home, which led PM Modi to launch Operation Sindhu.

Harbinger of peace mulling to join the war 

If we turn our attention to the North American superpower, the president of that country seems to be in a fix. During the initial days, Trump called for Iran’s unconditional surrender,  but Iran, in turn, retaliated by saying, ‘US military intervention will have irreparable damage’. Moreover, it also emphasised that it would not discuss the future of its nuclear programme while under attack by Israel. 

Now the man, who claims to be the harbinger of peace, is himself mulling whether he should join the war or not.

That's all for this week, we will be back with more next week. Till then, stay safe and stay tuned to DH to catch all the breaking news and latest updates.

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DH Newsletters Team