Prime Minister Narendra Modi is among the few Indians to have appeared on Time magazine’s list of the ‘100 most influential people of 2020’. Modi is the only Indian politician to make the coveted list. However, his addition to the list this year comes with harsh criticism of the divisive politics of the BJP.
Prime Minister Modi, who has become the epicenter of Indian politics for the past 6 years, has become a polarizing figure and the article written by Time correspondent Karl Vick claims that the Modi government works it has eroded the secular nature of India.
“They have all resided in India, which the Dalai Lama (who has spent most of his life in refuge there) has praised as” an example of harmony and stability … Narendra Modi has cast all that into question, “he writes. Vick in Time’s 100th Piece on PM Modi.
“Although almost all of India’s prime ministers come from the nearly 80% of the population that is Hindu, only Modi has ruled as if no one else mattered.”
Vick argues that the BJP has “rejected not only elitism but also pluralism.”
The short article also criticizes the Modi government for using the Covid-19 pandemic as a “pretext to stifle dissent.”
While there is growing criticism in the country regarding some of the policies of the BJP-led NDA government, a recent India Today-Karvy Insights Mood of the Nation (MOTN) survey found that PM Modi remains the most popular leader in the country.
The poll found that 66 percent of the people believed that Narendra Modi should be the next prime minister of India.
While PM Modi was criticized for threatening democracy, another Indian on the list was a curious addition for his unwavering protest against the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act. Bilkis, one of the dadis who became the face of Shaheen Bagh’s historic protest against the CAA and the NRC, has also found a place on the Times’ 100 Most Influential People list.
PM Modi has been a recurring name on Time magazine’s ‘100 Most Influential People’ list and has appeared on the list four times since he came to power in 2014. His name appeared on the list in 2014, 2015, 2017 and 2020.
Last year, the Time magazine had infamously published a cover calling the prime minister ‘Divider-in-Chief’ just before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
