2070 Only 50 Years Away
Normally a man used to whisking a magic wand at midnight and policy getting implemented within 10 sec past 12, Modiji seems to have done some unique yoga pose to have given a calm, patient and thoughtful five decades notice for the zero emission climate change goal. Ecstatic, Britain’s born again imperialist, Boris, was driven to endless hugs with Modiji as he felt he had achieved one promise in the COP 26 meetings that was worthy of looking forward to.
What can humanity want more than a slow burning ray of hope as it dies with congested overheated lungs, water up to its knees and praying to live up to the momentous year, 2070 when a new yug will dawn. Then the world will change and those still left with a few functioning alveoli can recover without Oxygen cylinders.
Modiji’s promise to deliver by 2070 has been more than a notch in British Prime Minister’s achievement at COP26. Boris committed UK to net zero by 2050. Greta’s school warriors were not happy. Too late they said. Now Modiji has added another two decades making Boris’s promise look, ‘ASAP by tomorrow’.
It is a great relief for Boris. Most middle class school age English Girls like to go on a ‘discover yourself’ extended round India tour. A chink in Greta’s army. So they are not going to say ‘Modi Hai Hai’. Which means Boris wins as he can say I am reaching the goal post faster than ‘my huggy friend Modi’. Meanwhile Modi, ‘Hugs r Us’, knows he doesn’t have to deliver.
Unless Jeff Bezos’s money finds the magic elixir of eternal life, both Boris (57) and Modi (71) will be long gone into another world beyond before 2070. So they won’t even be here to be called out.
Brilliant stroke of strategy by the Indian PM and a quick take on opportunity if ever by Boris, a person never to let one pass by. No doubt Greta was walking the streets with her force at the weekend frustrated.
Panic Over A Paper Tiger
If some of the media coverage of the Khalistan Referendum held in London are to be believed, the National Security Advisors of UK and India are to meet and spend quite some time over something that has the relevance of a meteor in the third galaxy away.
The world of Indian security threats must be near nirvana if Khalistan Referendum is the most pressing issue giving Mr Doval sleepless nights. No wonder the Sikhs for Justice (SFJ) have boasted of being a real danger to the mental state of India’s rulers.
The Indian State, used to throwing people in cells for just using constitutional rights such as free speech or civil rights or judicial judgements, can’t fathom why other countries don’t do the same for India. One Indian media even went as far as, ‘doesn’t Johnson understand that this (not stopping Khalistan Referendum) could affect India – UK relations!’
Apparently the Indian Foreign Secretary used most of his press conference at Glasgow to attack the ‘Khalistan Referendum’. Allegedly even PM Modi raised this issue with PM Johnson, obviously seeing it as a greater threat to the Globe than climate issues. Climate can wait till 2070, but freedom of expression! How can that be permitted in United Kingdom, especially for Sikhs! Boris must have been lost for words for the first time, standing on SNP ground, Glasgow and being asked by Indian PM to stop an independence campaign. Did PM Modi think of the irony of his demand, if he did indeed make it?
There appears to be a bit of misunderstanding between the two countries on democracy, article 19, freedom of speech and the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights. As many an Indian journalist and news media will say behind closed doors, freedom of speech in India means ‘freedom as tolerated’ by the Government of the day. From Indira to Modi, it has been interpreted as such.
In UK, freedom of speech is, well, anything that a person wants to say regardless of what Government prefers. Sometimes it can lead to litigation by individuals named by an overzealous free speech wallah. But government doesn’t have that luxury. Nor does British police, Army or secret Services oblige Government by incarnating or knocking off a person who campaigns against Boris, the Queen, the State or even House of Lords.
Somewhere during transfer of power in 1947, this aspect of democracy wasn’t hammered home properly. So repeatedly Indian officials and PM’s insist that UK, USA and even UN follow India’s interpretation of freedom of speech. It wants the whole human rights world to accept Indian constitutional concept of any campaign or desire for freedom to be labelled as sedition!
The focus on the Khalistan Referendum, the over reaction by Indian officials in its various embassies is bizarre. It exposes an abnormal neurosis among decision and policy makers at the top of Indian security and ministerial team.
Referendums are held by Governments. UN doesn’t hold referendum unless the Security Council sanctions it and all five veto holding members agree. So what’s the panic all about? Civil society cannot hold ‘referendums’ any more than form ‘Parliaments’. They can hold pretend ones or engage in theatrical versions.
The Indian press has been shrieking that ISI is behind this and some even said that many Pakistanis voted in London in the ‘referendum that isn’t a referendum. Some even accuse China. The hysterical coverage is hilarious.
It will be foolish of Pakistan or China to be financing or helping with this non-referendum referendum. India can easily finance a Baluchistan referendum or even a Tibetan referendum in UK in retaliation if any of these countries consider raising the issue at UN.
But if Modi and Doval think that a paper referendum with no legal or political value is the greatest threat India is facing while being surrounded by hostile countries on all its borders and a Islamic State (ISIS) considering launching a strategy of attacks within India from basis in Afghanistan, one can only think of the last days of the Mughal Empire. The Emperor would not look at real threat from colonialists but concentrated on pointless small ones in his Kingdom.
As for NSA India raising this with NSA UK, it will be better for High Commissioner of India (HCI) I to talk to Priti Patel, Britain’s Home Minister, who, despite being alleged to be a Modi fan, will tell the HCI, that there is nothing she can do. British law interprets freedom of expression as it literally means.
The more India reacts, by labelling SFJ as terrorist and the referendum as a ‘great threat’ on par with border attacks by China, the more Sikh nationalists around the world participate in it. If all it takes to create panic in India is to put a cross on a paper with no teeth in London, why not do it again and again. That’s what many say. It is more than surrealist. If China is financing it, their officials must be having a real laugh.
