New Delhi: The US government is likely to end its 9-year long boycott of Gujarat Chief Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi. US ambassador to India Nancy Powell has sought a meeting with Modi after officially boycotting him for years.
The meeting scheduled on Thursday will be a considerable boost for the BJP and Modi's supporters in the US, where Indian-American groups have been lobbying for years against the US's revocation of Modi's visa in 2005, over the 2002 riots.
"Well, the United States of America seeing the changed scenario is now extending an olive branch to Mr Narendra Modi. Nobody is dying to go to the United States of America. We will decide when it comes whether we want to go there or not." BJP leader Kirti Azad said.
Ironically, Minister of External Affairs Salman Khurshid has been critical of the meeting even as the ministry approved it. "In the past we have been lectured by countries on human rights. What US makes of what happened in Gujarat and what will they say to him will be interesting to know," Khurshid said.
Sources say the US began to revise its position in 2013 after it became clear that Modi would be a significant national player after the Lok Sabha elections in India. In February 2012, a US official had told CNN-IBN that the US could engage with Modi once the court passed an order on the riot cases.
"I think a lot of this will depend on some of the decisions that are made in the Indian courts, and many of those decisions, as you know, are still outstanding," United States Ambassador Bob Blake said.
Whether it was the SIT clean chit, or the change at the helm of South Asian affairs at the state department, it is clear that the US is considering this as the best time to make its move on Modi even if eyebrows would be raised with elections just 2 months away.
Comments
0 comment