New Delhi: In the first US presidential debate between President Donald Trump and Democrat candidate Joe Biden Wednesday, several references were made to India by the former but none of them were flattering.
Trump questioned the accuracy of the Covid death toll in the country and also criticised India for “sending dirt up into the air” like Russia and China.
The President made similar comments in May this year when he told UK-based television network ITV that India doesn’t have “good air, not very good water” and “you can’t even breathe” in certain cities.
This was in marked contrast to the bonhomie Trump shared with Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the ‘Namaste Trump’ event in February this year, which was also the US President’s first state visit to India.
Similarly, it seemed like the two state leaders shared a ‘friendship’ during the ‘Howdy Modi!’ event in September last year that was held in Houston, Texas, where Modi even endorsed Trump’s 2020 re-election bid by announcing “Abki baar, Trump sarkar [This time, Trump government]”.
ThePrint takes a look at what Trump has said about India and Modi in recent years:
15 September 2018: While addressing world leaders at the 73rd session of the UN General Assembly, Trump described India as “a free society [of] over a billion people, successfully lifting countless millions out of poverty and into the middle class”.
1 October 2018: During a White House press conference, Trump called India the “tariff king” but said it was keen on negotiating a trade deal with the US to keep him happy.
10 October 2018: When asked about India’s decision to sign a $4.5 billion deal with Russia for the S-400 missile defence system, Trump said India will soon “find out” about the US response. He told reporters in Washington D.C.: “India is going to find out, aren’t they?”
2 January 2019: Trump mocked PM Modi for funding a ‘library’ in Afghanistan while implying the US should invest less overseas during his first cabinet meeting of the year in Washington D.C. He said he got along very well with Modi, but that the latter was “constantly telling me he built a library in Afghanistan”.
He added: “You know what that is? That’s like five hours of what we spend…And we’re supposed to say, ‘Oh, thank you for the library.’ I don’t know who’s using it in Afghanistan.” Officials later confirmed that India had not built a library in Afghanistan and that Trump probably confused it with the country’s Parliament building, which India had constructed.
11 June 2019: Trump hit out at India for imposing high tariffs on Harley Davidson motorcycles. The president said: “He (Modi) reduced it by 50% with one phone call. I said it’s still unacceptable because it’s 50% versus nothing. It’s still unacceptable.”
28 June 2019: On the sidelines of the G-20 Summit in Japan’s Osaka, Trump congratulated Modi on his re-election victory and pledged some “very big” trade deals.
Trump said: “You did indeed have a landslide election and that was a great election….You have done a great job in pulling everyone together. Many factions were fighting, I remember when you first took over and we were talking, they were fighting with each other and now they are loving you”.
24 September 2019: On the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, Trump called Modi the “Father of India” — a title historically attributed to Mahatma Gandhi.
24 February, 2020: During the ‘Namaste Trump’ event in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, Trump heaped praises on the Indian Prime Minister, saying, “The life of Prime Minister Modi underscores the limitless promise of this great nation. He started out by his father’s side as a ‘chee wala’, a tea-seller.” He also called him “very tough.”
25 February, 2020: Shortly after offering to mediate between India and Pakistan, Trump called the Kashmir issue “a big problem” and clarified his stance in a press briefing in New Delhi.
“I didn’t say anything about that [being a mediator]. Kashmir obviously is a big problem between India and Pakistan, they are going to work out their problem. They have been doing it for a long time,” he said at a press conference.
8 April 2020: Trump called Modi “great” and “really good” after the Indian PM lifted country’s ban on hydroxychloroquine exports. This was a U-turn from Trump’s comments just a few days earlier, when he talked of “retaliation” if India did not lift the ban on the drug. The President also tweeted that India’s help “will not be forgotten”.
Extraordinary times require even closer cooperation between friends. Thank you India and the Indian people for the decision on HCQ. Will not be forgotten! Thank you Prime Minister @NarendraModi for your strong leadership in helping not just India, but humanity, in this fight!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 8, 2020
4 September 2020: In a bid to appeal to Indian-American voters ahead of the 2020 US presidential elections, Trump said at a press conference, “We have great support from India. We have great support from Prime Minister Modi. I would think that the Indian people would be voting for Trump.”
4 September 2020: As India-China tensions began rising in Ladakh, Trump extended a helping hand to the two countries. At a White House news conference he said: “While we’re at it, we’re talking about China and India, (they) are going at it pretty good on the border, as you know. It has been very nasty.”
He added, “And we stand ready to help, with respect to China and India”.
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India does have high polluion levels and the problem of contaminated water in some cities. What Trump said is correct, I doubt your intention about the article is something else. Trump has always been straight forward and not like politically correct to appeal to certain segments of people as other leaders do and especially in our country before 2014.
Well I seems it good bcoz criticism is good
And it’s reality government not providing clean water and air to it’s people
Does Trump respect Modi? Of course not. Trump just wants to use the right wing voteable in the US to vote for him. Modi needs Trump, not the other way round.
What is the point of this article?