Features

Modi and BJP: set for electoral hat trick at home; caught in dirty tricks abroad

Published

2 years ago

2023/12/10

by Rajan Philips

After a few setbacks at home and abroad, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has led the BJP to an impressive set of three victories out of four state elections in India’s heartland. If the grand old Congress Party was planning to do to the upstart Modi regime what the gallant Aussies did to Team India at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Gujarat, the outcome has turned out to be more like – well, the exit of England in World Cup cricket. The BJP won clear majorities in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh; all three northern states won by the Congress in the 2018 state elections.

The Congress managed to win a majority in Telangana in the south, displacing Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), the regional party that has been in power ever since Telangana was carved out of Andhra Pradesh in 2014. There was a fifth election in Mizoram, the northeastern frontier state, where the ruling Mizo National Front has won again.

The elections in the five states that were spread over the month of November, have been called “the semi-finals” before the final next year – India’s gargantuan parliamentary elections set for April-May 2024 to elect the country’s 18^th Lok Sabha. Modi detractors were hoping for a good showing by the opposition that could have been the launching pad for a concerted challenge to Modi and the BJP in the general election next year. Instead, it is Modi who has come out on top and now seems well set to achieve his coveted hat trick triumph.

Mixed Year

Prime Minister Modi has had a mixed year in 2023. At times he soared internationally, but of late his overseas gloss has begun to wear off. In June, the Prime Minister made a state visit to the US, where he thrilled Hindutva Indian Americans who flocked to see him in their thousands; was feasted to a state banquet at the White House; and addressed the US Congress for a second time – joining an awkwardly elite club of Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela and Benjamin Netanyahu.

In August, he attended the BRICS summit in South Africa and played a balancing role between members and aspirants divided over the Russo-Ukraine conflict – that is now reaching a wintry stalemate to Putin’s delight and his detractor’s horror. The climax of India’s global projections was the hosting of the G20 Summit in September.

October and November have not been good for the global image of Modi and that of India that Modi seems determined to cast in Hindutva light. Already in September, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had made the sensational allegation in the Canadian parliament, accusing “agents of the Indian government” of involvement in the June killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Sikh Canadian citizen and a Khalistani activist. India rejected the accusation vigorously and resorted to diplomatic harassment. Trudeau was ridiculed and reviled by pro-Modi Indian media and pundits. Now the tables have turned.

On November 30, after weeks of media reporting, the US Department of Justice officially released a criminal indictment that had been filed in the US courts alleging a plot involving Indian government agents targeting Sikh activists around the world, with multiple assassinations planned in Canada and the US. All the information is now out in the public, but what is most concerning is that this information had been shared by US (and Canadian) officials with their Indian counterparts, including at the summit level between President Biden, Prime Minister Trudeau and Prime Minister Modi, before the Canadian Prime Minister went public with his government’s allegations.

Yet the Indian government officially rejected Canada’s concerns and created a diplomatic kerfuffle, while full well knowing that the dirty tricks of some of its agents were known to the Americans and the rest of the intelligence sharing five-eye countries (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, UK and US). The US indictment and Canada’s allegations are not the only instance where the Modi government has been accused of intelligence operations and overreach. Other instances include the conviction of eight former Indian naval officers on espionage charges in Qatar, and operations targeting Khalistani activists in Pakistan, Nepal, Italy, the United Kingdom and Thailand.

In the UK, just before the June killing in Canada, there were suspicions about the death of another Sikh activist, Avtar Singh Khanda, a 35-year-old who died in a hospital after a short illness this summer. The foiled assassination attempt that is the subject of the US indictment targeted the US Sikh activist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun. The US indictment will now rekindle the suspicions over Mr. Khanda’s hospital death in Birmingham.

Different Species

To India’s Modi nation, the intelligence overreaches abroad are not a source of embarrassment but a badge of honour, that India under Modi is coming of age in undertaking Black Ops that were once the forte of the likes of the CIA, KGB and Mossad. A sign of Modi flexing India’s muscle globally. The Indian opposition is nationally too weak to challenge this mindset even though it goes against every grain of what were the world views of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru and which informed India’s foreign policy and defined its role in world affairs.

There were twists and turns under Indira Gandhi, but even she never wavered from maintaining India’s solidarity with the countries of the Global South. Tactically, she may have been the shrewd Bonaparte – as Hector Abhayavardhana, who knew Feroze and Indira Ghandi reasonably well, used to conceptualize – playing imperialism against the masses, and the masses against imperialism. Narendra Modi is a different species.

The all-aligned philosophy of Modi and his Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar has come a cropper with their controversial position on Israel’s non-stop retaliation against Hamas and the devastation of Gaza. India was isolated at the UN, Modi kept away from a recent virtual BRICS gathering, and India’s pitch to be the voice of the Global South at COP28 in Dubai fizzled out because, as the Politico headlined, climate was crowded out at COP28 by the renewed Israel-Gaza war. But none of this made any dent in Modi’s electoral juggernaut in India. The intelligence cock ups and foreign policy setbacks that would have extracted a hefty political price in pre-Modi India or in any other country that practises elections, were hardly an issue at any of the State Assembly elections.

The opposition, which was solely the Congress in the elections, was too timid to raise them as issues. Going solo to take on the BJP was the Congress Party’s singular blunder. The background to this goes back to the formation of INDIA (Indian National Developmental, Inclusive Alliance) – the multi-party alliance that has been in the making since June 2023, for the purpose of contesting the 2024 Lok Sabha election on a common platform and with a united slate of candidates. Early goings on seemed good, and the project received a terrific boost from the unexpected victory of the Congress Party in the Karnataka State Assembly elections in May.

North-South Divide

The state elections in November were expected to be used as a pilot opportunity for the INDIA alliance parties to field common slates of candidates in the five different states. Then the Congress got back to its old ways, spurned calls for seat sharing by other parties, and went on its own in each state except for handing a handful of seats to the Communist Party (CPM) in Telangana. The Congress apparently thought that it would do well in the three Hindi belt states that it had won in 2018, and new victories would give the Party a better bargaining position for seat sharing in next year’s national election. Now that its cynical scheme has backfired, it would be an uphill task for the Congress Party to mend fences and regain the trust of the other parties in the alliance.

The election results clearly show the north-south divide in India’s electoral politics. The BJP seems unassailable in the Hindi-belt states in the north, but seems unable to make a similar impact in the southern states. Besides the South, regional parties are also powerful in the eastern states. Much is being made about Congress supporters by Party’s victory in Telangana, victories in the South are hardly adequate to be competitive nationally. Among the opposition parties, the Congress controls state governments in just three states – Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana. Non-Congress INDIA alliance parties are in power in eight states, and two eastern states are governed by parties that are not allied with either BJP or the new INDIA alliance.

With so much disaggregation, it would be impossible for the opposition parties to pose an effective challenge to Modi and the BJP in the next Lok Sabha election. The BJP victories in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan were influenced by a host of factors – the Modi effect, the Central Government’s welfare programs, a deep war chest, strong grassroot level organization, and attractiveness to a new cross-section of voters that includes the youth, women, the more educated, and the more marginalized caste groups. The encompassing canvas of course is the ideology and experience of Hindutva, which has tremendous purchase in the interior Hindi states but little resonance in the coastal and southern states.

All in all, Narendra Modi seems set for a hat trick next year, notwithstanding allegations of dirty tricks abroad. The state elections in November could have been an effective launching pad for a united opposition to mount a reasonably significant challenge to Modi’s bid for a third term. By its decision to go solo in the state elections, the Congress Party would seem to have irreparably botched what a few months ago looked set to grow into a very palpable challenge to Prime Minister Modi and his government.

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Features

Proactive peacemaking becomes a paramount need

Published

20 hours ago

2026/06/4

Sahan Weerasooriya

Wasting wars: Some war-displaced people in Lebanon. BBC

It may be some time before the full impact of food inflation is felt in the West. Until such time the world would continue to keep itself in suspense over whether the Trump administration is in earnest when it seeks to convey the impression that it is backing a negotiated solution in West Asia.

As is usually the case, consumer stress would be one of the final determinants of political change. To the degree to which the average US consumer somehow ‘muddles through’ and puts the food on the table, to the same extent would the Republican sections of the US public in particular be tolerant of the Trump administration’s inconsistent handling of the West Asian war and the main issues stemming from it. That is, there would be no grave popular disaffection and a demand for political change in the short term.

However, the indications are that the Trump administration’s support base is suffering some erosion in the wake of the current economic crisis. While reports indicate that Democratic sections are firming-up their opposition to the political centre, Republican support for Trump is also showing signs of waning, we are given to understand.

The above developments are probably why Trump is on record as having given Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a ‘dressing down’ recently on his seeming intransigence on the question of giving negotiations a chance in West Asia. The show of displeasure could be really aimed by Trump at containing the impatience of the American public.

However, the current ground situation in the Middle East, particularly the uncontained bloodshed, is likely to impress on the thinking sections of the world that more than temporary political change is needed in West Asia and the US.

A well thought out political solution that addresses all the contentious issues at the heart of the Middle East conflict is what enlightened opinion would demand, and very rightly. Right now, the ‘peace efforts’ initiated by the Trump administration give the impression of being piecemeal solutions at best.

There have been, of course, numerous initiatives in the past aimed at bringing permanent peace to the Middle East. These failed mainly because they did not address in full the root causes of the conflict.

At bottom the Middle East conflict is mainly about race and religious hate bred by socio-economic and material inequalities. For instance, if the Palestinian people were not displaced and deprived of land occupied by them at the time of the founding of the Israeli state, ethnic enmities would not have grown to the current unmanageable proportions.

When addressing the above questions, though, it must be remembered that the Israelis too were a displaced people who were entitled to land and a state of their own in the Middle East. Basically, out of these seemingly irreconcilable and conflicting demands have grown the Middle East imbroglio.

Middle East peace is considerably about reconciling these demands and arriving at a solution that would ensure the creation of two states that would opt for peaceful co-existence thereafter.

As long as the US does not see the need for a non-partisan solution that addresses the needs of both ethnicities and religions and goes all-out, as it were, to have it implemented, the Middle East would continue to bleed.

However, staunching the blood flow through the creation of two states would be only half the job done, though a very important part of it. More pernicious, pervasive and difficult to remedy are the inter-ethnic and inter-religious hatreds that have been unleashed over the decades.

However, if substantial, long-lasting peace is to be fostered in the region the latter ‘demons’ would need to be exorcised from the hearts and minds of the communities concerned. No doubt an uphill task but one that must be undertaken by those who wish the region well.

The UN would need to put its ‘best foot forward’ in such undertakings but it is time that it dawned on the international community and other caring quarters that Middle East peace, and all other such uphill challenges, require proactive peacemaking on the part of all civilized sections for their effective management. That is, public involvement in peacemaking too is a must.

Since hatreds are harboured in the human consciousness the enmities embedded in the latter need to be managed and defused judiciously alongside other undertakings in a peace process. In the case of West Asia, such enmities could be even spread globe-wide besides being multi-dimensional. For instance, it ought to be thought-provoking that Iran is insistent on a peace initiative that would also include Lebanon.

Besides security considerations it is also ethnic and religious affiliations that account for Iran making this demand. For instance, the Shias are a numerically important religious community in Lebanon and they provide a significant number of Hizbollah fighters, who are in a vital sense carrying out a ‘proxy war’ for Iran. It also needs to be factored in that Iran is a Shia-majority country.

Thus trans-border religious affiliations could add to the complexities and enormity of ethno-religious conflicts. However, the task of managing centuries-long enmities needs to be launched and prodded on with by peacemakers since a downing of arms alone would not guarantee substantive peace.

It is not realized sufficiently that the process of ending hatreds begins with mutual apologies by antagonists to a conflict for the harm inflicted on each other. This would be anathema in some ears but there is no getting away from the requirement. It is the vital first step to permanent peace anywhere.

In fact there could be no reconciliation worth speaking of without such mutual apologies. It is a point worth re-iterating in these times when even the government of Sri Lanka is voicing the need for national reconciliation. Well, without the words, ‘I am sorry’, there could be no permanent end to enmities – they would do well to remember.

The above requirements may not go down very well with governments, but they resonate in the hearts and minds of most people, since they are inheritors of religious traditions of some kind.

This is a principal reason why peacemaking works well when publics too are involved in them. The effectiveness of such campaigns increases several fold when they have a Mahatma Gandhi or a Jawaharlal Nehru at their helm. A strong proactive involvement by the public in peace could lead to the emergence of such leaders at some point in these campaigns.

Features

Dialog Brings Sri Lanka’s Largest Digital Vesak Experience to Matara

Published

20 hours ago

2026/06/4

Sahan Weerasooriya

From left to right: Hon. Saroja Savithri Paulraj, Hon. Sunil Handunnetti, and Lasantha Theverapperuma experience the Dialog 5G Ultra-powered VR tours.

Official Digital Partner of the 2026 ‘Dakshina Prabha’ National Vesak Zone

Dialog Axiata PLC, Sri Lanka’s #1 connectivity provider, collaborated with the Ministry of Buddha Sasana, Religious and Cultural Affairs to bring one of Sri Lanka’s largest and most technologically advanced Vesak experiences to the ‘Dakshina Prabha’ National Vesak Zone. The three-day celebration, in Matara attracted more than hundred thousand visitors, who engaged with a series of innovative digital activities powered by Dialog 5G Ultra, including Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Virtual Reality (VR) experiences, digital pandols and a Data Dansala. The opening ceremony was attended by Hon. Sunil Handunnetti, Minister of Industry and Entrepreneurship Development and Hon. Saroja Savithri Paulraj, Minister of Women and Child Affairs, along with distinguished guests and Dialog’s senior management.

One of the key attractions at the venue was the Dialog 5G Ultra-powered Virtual Reality (VR) experience, which attracted more than 35,000 participants. The activation enabled devotees to virtually visit and pay homage to sacred Buddhist sites, including the Jaya Sri Maha Bodhi in India and the Atamasthana in Anuradhapura, directly from the Vesak zone in Matara.

Visitors receive complimentary mobile data through Dialog’s QR-powered Data Dansala.

Dialog also conducted an AI Digital Vesak Greeting Card Competition from 21 May to 01 June 2026, attracting numerous entries from across the country. The shortlisted designs were showcased across 20 large LED screens throughout the venue and across Matara City, and were also made available for download via mobile devices. Further, through the use of AI, traditional Jathaka Katha were reimagined in a digital format, demonstrating how technology can be used to preserve and enhance cultural and religious heritage. Together, these initiatives blended traditional Vesak celebrations with emerging technologies, offering visitors a unique and immersive way to engage with Vesak traditions.

Extending the spirit of Vesak through connectivity, Dialog conducted a special Data Dansala powered by its QR Reload platform, enabling visitors to receive complimentary mobile data by scanning QR codes placed across the venue. In addition to the Matara National Vesak Zone, similar Data Dansala activations were also conducted at the Gangaramaya and Bauddhaloka Vesak zones in Colombo.Visitors also had the opportunity to create personalised Vesak-themed digital photos through an AI Photo Booth, generating AI-enhanced portraits using their own photographs and adding a contemporary digital element to the Vesak celebrations.

Visitors watch AI-generated Jathaka Katha

Commenting on the initiative, Hon. Sunil Handunnetti, Minister of Industry and Entrepreneurship Development, said, “The 2026 Dakshina Prabha Vesak Festival marked the first time AI-powered digital innovations were incorporated into a National Vesak Festival in Sri Lanka. Presenting Buddhist stories and teachings through technology created a new and engaging way for visitors to connect with these traditions. We thank Dialog for supporting this initiative and for working closely with us to bring our vision to life. Their contribution played an important role in making this first-of-its-kind event a reality.”

Lasantha Theverapperuma, Group Chief Marketing Officer of Dialog Axiata PLC said, “We thank the Government of Sri Lanka for the opportunity to support the 2026 Dakshina Prabha National Vesak Festival and for embracing technology as part of this year’s celebrations. As the Official Digital Partner, we were privileged to contribute through our Dialog 5G Ultra and AI capabilities, creating new ways for visitors to engage with Vesak traditions while preserving their cultural significance for future generations.”

Beyond supporting the National Vesak Zone in Matara, Dialog also enhanced the Gangaramaya and Bauddhaloka Vesak zones through a range of digital activations during the Vesak season. The company additionally continued its sustainability initiatives, including the Thirasara Aloka Poojawa, which illuminated rural places of worship through solar-powered lighting solutions.

Features

Beauty, elegance and talent…for women

Published

20 hours ago

2026/06/4

Sahan Weerasooriya

Universal Woman is an international pageant focused on “beauty, elegance, and talent” for women, positioning itself as a platform to shape global ambassadors. The 2026 edition will be held in Cambodia, and Sri Lanka will be there, as well.

According to reports coming my way, contestants, at the international event, will work with industry trailblazers, under international standards.

Sri Lankan supermodel, runway and pageant trainer Chulpadmendra Kumarapathirana, is the National Director for Universal Woman Sri Lanka 2026.

With over two decades in the industry, Chula was crowned Miss Sri Lanka 2006, and has since shaped the next generation of titleholders through her Colombo-based Chulpadmendra Catwalk Studio, widely regarded as one of the country’s leading modelling academies.

The team behind Universal Woman Sri Lanka 2026

A former host of Derana Miss Sri Lanka for Miss World 2008 and a judge for Miss Universe Sri Lanka 2025, Chula now serves as National Director for Universal Woman Sri Lanka 2026, leading the franchise’s search for Sri Lanka’s delegate to the international final in Cambodia.

Applications for Universal Woman Sri Lanka 2026 are being taken, via WhatsApp: 077 659 4994, says Chula.

The judging panel for Universal Woman Sri Lanka 2026 includes Senaka De Silva, Pageant Aesthetic Advisor & Chairperson of the Judging Panel, Angela Seneviratne, Caroline Jurie, Rozelle Plunkett, and Suraj Mapa.

Universal Woman Sri Lanka 2026 officially began its journey with a first round of auditions, held in Colombo, marking the start of an exciting new chapter in Sri Lanka’s pageant industry.

Launching the first round of auditions

The platform aims to empower women while selecting an intelligent, confident, and inspiring representative to compete at the Universal Woman International Pageant 2026 in Cambodia, this September.

Universal Woman Sri Lanka now moves forward with the vision of creating one of the country’s most prestigious and empowering pageants while preparing to crown a queen who will proudly represent Sri Lanka on the international stage.