With PM visiting Ghana, Congress recalls Nkrumah-Nehru ties

New Delhi: With Prime Minister Narendra Modi embarking on a visit to Ghana, the Congress on Wednesday recalled the very warm relationship between former Ghanaian president Kwame Nkrumah and India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru.

Modi embarked on a five-nation visit to Ghana, Trinidad & Tobago, Argentina, Brazil, and Namibia from July 2 to 9, this morning.

Ghana will be his first port of call.

In a post on X, Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh said, "Super Premium Frequent Flier PM is in Ghana today. Till the mid-60s, Ghanian and indeed African politics was dominated by Kwame Nkrumah, who is an iconic figure. He shared a very warm relationship with Jawaharlal Nehru, which long pre-dated Ghana's independence in March 1957." A prominent road in Accra on which India House is located is named after Nehru, while the diplomatic enclave in New Delhi has a Kwame Nkrumah Marg, Ramesh pointed out.

"Nkrumah visited India from December 22, 1958 to January 8, 1959. He was in New Delhi, Mumbai, Nangal, Chandigarh, Jhansi, Agra, Bengaluru, Mysuru, and Pune. He spent five days in Bengaluru and Mysuru alone," the Congress leader recalled.

Nkumah paid special visits to the Trombay Atomic Energy Establishment, the National Physical Laboratory, the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, the Bhakra Nangal Dam, and the National Defence Academy, Ramesh said.

One offshoot of this extended visit was Indian assistance for the establishment of the Ghanaian Air Force, Ramesh said.

A few years earlier, Nehru had inaugurated the Department of African Studies at Delhi University before the decolonisation of the continent had begun, Ramesh recalled.

"Speaking on the occasion on Aug 5, 1955 he (Nehru) had said: it is so obviously necessary and desirable for people in India to study Africa, and not merely, as the Vice Chancellor said, because it is there...But you ignore the study of Africa at your peril.

"It is of the most urgent importance for us to understand Africa...and her problems and her people more particularly... When I think of Aftica, many ideas come to me...I have a tremendous feeling of atonement of humanity...the way Africa and the people of Africa have been treated for hundreds of years, a kind of feeling that the rest of humanity would perform 'prayashchit' for it," Ramesh quoted Nehru as saying.

Ramesh also shared archival footage from Nkrumah's visit to India and he being received by Nehru at the airport.

Nkrumah was also the first prime minister of Ghana and then served as the president. He was the PM of Ghana when he visited India In his departure statement, Modi said that at the invitation of Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama, he will be there on July 2 and 3.

"Ghana is a valued partner in the Global South and plays an important role in the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States. I look forward to my exchanges aimed at further deepening our historical ties and opening up new windows of cooperation, including in the areas of investment, energy, health, security, capacity building and development partnership," Modi said.

As fellow democracies, it will be an honour to speak at the Parliament of Ghana, he added.