BOGOTÁ : The biggest threat to India is the “attack on democracy”, India’s Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi said in an indirect reference to Prime Miniater Modi. Addressing an interaction at EIA University in Colombia, Gandhi said, “India has many religions, traditions, and languages. A democratic system provides a place for everyone. But right now, the democratic system is under attack from all sides.”
Speaking to engineering students, he said empires arise during energy transitions. “The British controlled the steam engine and coal. They became a superpower. We in India fought that empire and eventually got freedom in 1947. After the British, the Americans managed the transition from coal and steam to petrol and the internal combustion engine. Now we are facing a new transition to the electric motor, from the fuel tank to the battery. The real fight between the US, which has a maritime vision of the world, and China, which has a terrestial vision, is about who is going to manage this transition,” Gandhi said, adding that “Chinese are winning so far”.
India, he said, is China’s neighbour and a close partner of the US. “We are sitting right in the middle of where the forces are colliding.”
He said that India has immense potential. “It has a larger population than China. Instead of China’s centralised system, India is decentralised and diverse. India has a very complex system. India’s strengths are different from China’s. India also has an ancient spiritual and ideological tradition that is very useful for today’s world,” he said, adding, “India cannot suppress its people like China”.
Talking about the US, the senior Congress leader said President Donald Trump’s polarisation campaign is targeted at most of the unemployed.
“Despite the economic growth in India, we are unable to provide jobs because we are a service-based economy and are unable to produce. In America, most people polarised with Trump are those who have lost their jobs in the manufacturing sector. China has demonstrated production in a non-democratic environment, but we need a democratic structure. Therefore, the challenge is to develop a model of production in a democratic environment that can compete with China.”
