By Aravind Bhatikar

FOR a person who is neither an Indian MP nor holding any important position in any political party, it is no mean honour to get an invitation from the 114-year-old prestigious National Press Club in Washington DC in USA. Rahul Gandhi not only got an invitation, inter-alia, from the National Press Club at Washington DC but also from the famous Stanford University in California. His interaction with students, faculty and civil society and with the press and others in the National Press Club in Washington DC proved to everybody – if at all that proof was necessary – that our country now has a frank, fearless, mature, well informed and articulate alternative to Narendra Modi.
The mercenary electronic media and the social media brigades of Narendra Modi are pressing the accelerator hard in their frantic efforts to promote Narendra Modi as a world leader. The fast approaching state visit of Modi to USA and the G-20 summit in India in September are two events that Indians are going to see and hear ad nauseum over TV screens of “godi” media for the next few months.

OPPOSITION COALITION HAPPENING
The increasing popularity of Rahul Gandhi, the certainty of the Opposition parties’ coalition happening, and the probable victories of the Congress party in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh in the ensuing assembly elections, necessitates that the mercenary media steps up its efforts to brainwash the Indian electorate into believing that Modi is the only option.
A state visit by an Indian prime minister to USA is important but it is nothing more than a periodic strengthening of bilateral ties on various economic and political fronts between the two countries. Dr Manmohan Singh, the predecessor-in-office of Narendra Modi, had gone on a state visit to USA in November 2009. Narendra Modi will be going on a state visit to USA on June 22, almost at the fag end of his second term as prime minister.
The former president of India, Dr Radhakrishnan had gone on a state visit to the USA in 1963. Nine former prime ministers of India had routinely paid visits to USA for attending multi-lateral meetings and bilateral discussions with US presidents. There is no doubt that the “Goebbels” team of Modi and Shah will be working overtime to spread lies that the state visit of Narendra Modi is an unprecedented and an unique event in Indian history.
Narendra Modi’s presidentship of the G-20 has already being touted as his personal achievement, unprecedented in Indian politics. The G-20 is a group of 19 large countries and economically the most important among the countries of the world. Each member of the group becomes the president by rotation. Seventeen countries have been presidents of G-20 before it was India’s turn to hold the post for one year.
The euphoria that is being whipped up about Modi’s G-20 presidentship and his forthcoming state visit to USA underestimates the common sense, the wisdom and knowledge of the average Indian voter. The Indian voter will have to be alert and not allow the Goebbels team of the Modi-Shah duo to succeed in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections in 2024.