NEW DELHI, March 25 (UPI) -- India's Gujarat State Chief Minister Narendra Modi loves to be in the news, even if it is for wrong reasons. The 52-year-old Hindu nationalist leader loves the limelight even when he is painted as a hate figure among the Muslims.
Modi has dominated Indian headlines for a week over his debunked trip to the United States. Washington had slammed its door in his face last week when it not only refused Modi a diplomatic visa but also revoked his tourist/business visa citing his alleged complicity in the anti-Muslim violence in 2002.
The Indian National Human Rights Commission had said Modi's Hindu nationalist government in Gujarat did little to stop the violence that many in his Bharatiya Janata Party say was in response to the burning of a train compartment full of Hindus by a Muslim mob. More than 1,200 Muslims were killed in the carnage, mostly burned alive.
The Supreme Court had also called Modi a modern-day Nero and admonished him for failing to contain the violence.
Modi was scheduled to be the chief guest at the annual meeting of the Asian American Hotel Owners Association in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., from March 24-26 before his visa was revoked following appeals by lawmakers on Capitol Hill as well as human rights groups to stop the visit.
Reps. John Conyers, D-Mich., and Joseph Pitts, R-Pa., introduced a resolution in the House condemning Modi's alleged actions against Muslims and Christians in Gujarat. A letter from them and 21 other lawmakers called for the United States to deny Modi entry into the country.
"We respectfully request that the U.S. government deny Modi entry to the U.S. due to numerous reports of his involvement in horrific human rights violations," the letter had said.
A day before his departure, Modi was grounded in India when his U.S. visa was revoked under Section 212(A) (2) (g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which says that any foreign government official who is responsible for or directly carried out at any time particularly severe violations of religious freedom should not be eligible for a visa.
Modi called visa denial as an insult to Indian constitution, saying he was an elected head of a state government and the United States had humiliated every Indian by refusing him a visa.
India's federal government led by the Congress Party called the U.S. decision regrettable and urged Washington to review it. The United States reaffirmed earlier this week that it wouldn't let Modi enter its territory.
An infuriated Modi questioned Washington's foreign policy and demanded to see the chemical weapons recovered from Iraq. He announced a visit to Britain, America's strongest ally in the global war against terror. The UK visit was called off Thursday. Security reasons were cited after several Muslim organizations had warned of protests against Modi.
The inflated Modi balloon pricked on Thursday when New Delhi said that the U.S. decision was regrettable but this did not mean that Modi was absolved of his role in anti-Muslim carnage.
"It is a national embarrassment," the ruling Congress Party spokesman Anand Sharma told reporters. "The government of India had asked U.S. to review its decision. But it did not heed the request. BJP must think over it why it has happened."
Sharma said the government's request should be viewed in a limited perspective of granting a visa to a chief minister and nothing more than that. "Even the government of India has never endorsed the deeds of Gujarat Government," Sharma said.
But on Friday an incorrigible Modi addressed the Asian American Hotel Owners Association in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., via satellite and invited Florida Gov. Jeb Bush to visit India. Modi said his invitation to Jeb Bush, the brother of President George W. Bush, was to give him ''a taste of real hospitality.''
"I am able to speak to you not just because of technology but because of your association's determination to uphold democratic values and because of your ability to ignore motivated propaganda," Modi told the meeting of Florida-based association.
At least five major sponsors -- including American Express, Hilton, Choice Hotels, Cendant Corporation and Comcast - walked out of the hoteliers' convention.
Meanwhile, some former State Department officials say the decision to deny Modi a visa was unwise.
"I wouldn't have denied him the visa," Ambassador Dennis Kux told Indo Asian News Service. Kux is a senior policy scholar in the Asia program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and a retired Foreign Service South Asia specialist.
"I can understand the reasons for doing it, but I would have waited for court action (in India)," Kux said referring to Modi being denied a visa for "serious violation of religious freedom" for the Gujarat communal violence of 2002.
"It is an issue fraught with dilemmas. It has opened up something of a Pandora's box for the U.S.," said Walter Andersen, former State Department official, now associate director of the South Asian Studies department at the Johns Hopkins University.
Doubting that it will be regarded as a small matter by either New Delhi or Washington, he said: "But in some ways, it does turn out to be a blunder as some people have maintained," Andersen told IANS.
"I doubt Washington sees this as a way to win favor with the Islamic world," Andersen contended.
Modi's U.S. visit may not have got him as much political mileage as he got by his refused visa. The visa denial is like killing two birds with one stone. It suits Modi's political ambitions because he has emerged as a martyr or a hero among the majority Hindu community. The visa denial also suited Washington's desire to portray itself favorably in the Muslim world.
More than 81 percent of India's 1 billion people are Hindus. India is home to world's second-largest Muslim population after Indonesia.
