Trudeau’s disaster
The Business Insider reports:
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, normally a darling of Western media, has been roundly, and sometimes savagely, mocked for a trip to India that included cultural, fashion, and political blunders at every turn.
Trudeau’s trip began to go awry right off the bat. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, known for his social-media savvy, did not make any posts welcoming Trudeau, who was greeted off the plane by a low-level agricultural minister.
On Tuesday, Trudeau’s wife, Sophie, posed for a photo with Jaspal Atwal, a Sikh separatist who was once convicted of trying to assassinate an Indian politician.
Ouch.
Back in Canada, Trudeau’s liberal party has ties to the country’s Sikh community, some of whom support the Khalistan movement, which backs a new Sikh state in India’s Punjab region. When Outlook India magazine pointed this out, it found itself disinvited from a dinner with Trudeau.
“Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau feted the world over as the new face of ‘liberalism’ seem to find it difficult to accommodate critical media coverage,” the magazine wrote.
Though Trudeau assured India’s government that he didn’t back the separatist movement, Canada’s diplomatic mission had also sent a dinner invitation to Atwal – which it later rescinded.
They invited a convicted wannabee assassin!
But the political blunders paled in comparison with the more visible cultural missteps. On several occasions Trudeau and his family appeared dressed in traditional Indian clothing, something other Western politicians don’t usually attempt with such vigour.
Prominent Indian personalities expressed their distaste for Trudeau’s dress, with India Today calling it “tacky.” Trudeau showed up at an event full of Bollywood stars in full traditional dress, while the movie stars themselves simply wore black suits.
Hilarious.
Trudeau’s hometown paper, the Ottawa Citizen, compared Trudeau’s India trip to George H.W. Bush’s 1992 trip to Tokyo, where Bush vomited on Japan’s prime minister.
“As for what ‘the work, achievements and objectives’ of this cavalcade of embarrassment might amount to, it would have been better, in hindsight, if Trudeau had gone to India alone, invited himself to dinner with Modi, and thrown up in his lap,” the Citizen wrote.
Harsh.
Vice points out:
Try imagining Indian PM Narendra Modi hanging out in Ottawa for a week alternately dressed like a cowboy or a Mountie or a French Canadian biker, and you’ll have some idea of how obnoxious it was to watch Justin Trudeau traipse around the subcontinent playing ethnic dress up.
If he visits NZ will he wear Maori haka outfits everywhere?