Citing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “friendship” with global leaders, Vice President CP Radhakrishnan, in his first public event since assuming the post, on Monday expressed hope for better India-US relations despite the imposition of huge trade tariffs by Donald Trump’s administration.
“Even as 50% (import) duty (or tariff) has been put on India by the US, Trump continues to say, ‘Modi is my great friend’. Even in that situation, he has not said he is against Modi,” Radhakrishnan said on Monday as he released four books of PM Modi’s selected speeches.
“Modi is a great friend of Putin. He is a great friend of Trump. At the same time, (Chinese President) Xi Jinping, despite the differences of international politics, is a good friend of Modi,” he added.
“That’s why (Modi) may turn the impossible into possible. And, if there is a will in your heart to serve humanity without any expectation, you will find a way,” he further said, as per an HT report of the event.
The four books he released are based on some of the PM’s speeches on the theme of ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas’ (inclusive development), delivered in the 2022–24 period.
The Vice President said the speeches could help understand Modi’s approach to issues, and his “deep understanding of thoughts and how people’s sentiments can’t be ignored by a great leader”.
He also spoke about the philosophy of leadership. “India has shown that our aspiration of becoming a global power is not driven by dominance, but by the idea of global welfare. Why do we want to become powerful? Not to dictate terms to others, but to take humanity as a whole,” the RSS-BJP veteran from Tamil Nadu said.
“At the same time, nobody can dictate terms to the poor nations,” he added.
Also at the event, Rajya Sabha deputy chairman Harivansh listed “our biggest problem” as the “dependence on other countries” — something PM Modi also said after Trump imposed a massive $100,000 fee on H-1B visas by which mostly Indians go to the US to work in high-tech sectors.
“We had to wait for PM Modi to show the vision and target of becoming a developed nation by 2047,” Harivansh said.
I&B minister Ashwani Vaishnaw also praised the PM. “There are more toilets in India than the entire population of Japan; 800 million people get ration without any hindrance; we are running the biggest food security programme in the world,” he said.
Radhakrishnan’s predecessors M Venkaiah Naidu and Jagdeep Dhankhar had also released books about the PM during their tenure. He became the 15th Vice President of India after defeating Opposition candidate B Sudershan Reddy on September 9. He took oath at the Rashtrapati Bhavan on September 12. Dhankhar had resigned mid-term on July 21 citing health issues.
