Is Barack Obama’s comment about Muslims in India a case of ‘look who’s talking’?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is back on Indian soil after being away for six days to the United States and Egypt. He was received at Delhi airport by Union Minister of State for External Affairs Meenakshi Lekhi and BJP chief J P Nadda. Many would call his four-day visit to the US – where he led the Yoga Day celebrations at the United Nations headquarters, signed important deals for the country in the space and tech sectors and even held a joint press conference with US president Joe Biden – a roaring success.

However, as he made his way to India, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman minced no words when she attacked the Opposition for raising non-issues and also took on former US president Barack Obama, questioning his comments on Indian-Muslims.

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Sitharaman said, “I am exercising restraint while speaking on foreign matters. We want a good friendship with the US. But from there also, United States Commission on International Religious Freedom’s (USCIRF) comments about religious tolerance in India comes and the former president is also saying something. Didn’t bombings happen in six countries – Syria, Yemen, Saudi and Iraq and other Muslim countries – during his term (as US president)?”

#WATCH | FM Nirmala Sitharaman says, "...It was surprising that when PM was visiting the US, a former US President (Barack Obama) was making a statement on Indian Muslims...I am speaking with caution, we want a good friendship with the US. But comments come from there on India's… pic.twitter.com/6uyC3cikBi

— ANI (@ANI) June 25, 2023

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“When he makes such allegations against India, will the people trust him,” she said.

But what made Finance Minister Sitharaman react in this manner? Why did she choose to criticise the former president and ‘good friend’ of PM Modi Barack Obama?

Obama on India, and Indian Muslims

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s comments against Barack Obama come after the former US president gave an interview to CNN’s Christiane Amanpour last week on the matter of democracy. His interview came just hours before PM Modi, who was on his first state visit to the US, was going to take questions at a joint press conference with President Joe Biden.

In his interview to the CNN journalist, Obama spoke about how democratic institutions in the United States and around the world have grown “creaky” and warned that economic and social inequities would only make it harder to sustain healthy democracies moving forward.

“I do believe that democracy will win if we fight for it,” Obama told Amanpour in Athens, where he is discussing issues of democracy. “Our existing democratic institutions are creaky, and we’re going to have to reform them.”

During the interview, Obama was also asked pointed questions on how he and other US presidents would deal with authoritarian rulers or an “illiberal democrat like Modi” who also happened to be allies. This context set, he was specifically asked how he would advise Biden to address these issues with Modi.

Obama said it was complex as not every person was an American ally and in times like those the larger national interest gained importance. When asked what advice he would give Biden to tell Modi, he said that when Biden meets Modi “the protection of the Muslim minority in a majority Hindu India is something worth mentioning”. Then, he elaborated somewhat casually: “If you do not protect the rights of ethnic minorities in India, there is a strong possibility that India, at some point, starts pulling apart…that would be contrary to the interests of not only the Muslim India, but also to Hindu India.”

Obama’s remarks coincided with the fact that two US Congresswomen – Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib – from the Democratic Party boycotted Modi’s speech at the joint session of the US Congress, saying that the ‘Modi government has repressed religious minorities’.

Omar, the representative from Minnesota, had earlier said, “Prime Minister Modi’s government has repressed religious minorities, emboldened violent Hindu nationalist groups, and targeted journalists/human rights advocates with impunity. I will NOT be attending Modi’s speech.”

Echoing similar comments, Rashida Tlaib also wrote, “It’s shameful that Modi has been given a platform at our nation’s capital — his long history of human rights abuses, anti-democratic actions, targeting Muslims & religious minorities, and censoring journalists is unacceptable. I will be boycotting Modi’s joint address to Congress.”

Earlier, as many as 75 Democratic senators and members of the House of Representatives had sent a letter to US president Joe Biden, asking him to raise human rights issues with PM Modi, according to a report published by Hindustan Times.

Reactions to Obama’s remarks

Unsurprisingly, the comments made by Obama haven’t been received well in India. While Nirmala Sitharaman questioned the former US president on Sunday, she wasn’t the only one.

Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, also a BJP leader, said that there were many “Hussain Obama in India” and his priority will be in dealing with them, reacting to a social media post speculating if Assam police will go to arrest former US president Barack Obama over his remarks on the alleged vulnerability of minorities in India.

BJP’s vice president Baijayant Jay Panda also chimed in, saying it was preposterous to see the former US president “pander to the anti-India crowd, lecturing India in the same breath as China for its atrocities in Xinjiang”.

Taking to Twitter, he wrote: ““While @pewresearch finds 98 per cent of India’s Muslims say they’re free to practice their religion without hindrance, it is preposterous to see @BarackObama pander to the anti-India crowd, lecturing India in the same breath as China for its atrocities in Xinjiang. This, when President @JoeBiden is hosting PM @narendramodi & lavishing attention on the US-India relationship. And by a former President on whose watch race relations exploded in his country. Tsk, tsk, talk about hypocrisy and false narratives.”

In a second tweet, he said there was a chronology worth understanding behind Barack Obama’s statement on India.

It’s worth understanding the chronology.
-First, President @JoeBiden finally went out on a limb to call a spade a spade, ie Xi a dictator
-Next, he had the audacity to treat PM @narendramodi to rare honours & boost US-India ties to the next level
-What a ‘coincidence’ that Barry…

— Baijayant Jay Panda (@PandaJay) June 23, 2023

Obama’s questionable legacy

While making such comments, many of Obama’s critics have asked for an introspection of the former US president’s legacy.

A CNN report published in 2014 had shown a list of countries that were bombed by the US under the Obama administration. These were Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, Iraq, and Syria.

Not just this. In 2017, Kenneth Roth, an American attorney and writer, wrote that a careful review of Obama’s major human rights decisions showed a mixed record. “In fact, he has often treated human rights as a secondary interest — nice to support when the cost was not too high, but nothing like a top priority he championed.”

There’s also, as an Al Jazeera report mentions, the large scale use of drone strikes outside active war zones; support or muted criticisms of repressive regimes across the Middle East and North Africa – and beyond; sale or supply of far more weapons than any administration since World War II, and the failure to close Guantanamo Bay.

Does Obama’s comments hurt the Indo-US ties? Not really. Biden and Modi put up quite a show of bonhomie during the recently-concluded state visit and the PM’s ability to shore up deals for India on American soil show just how successful it was.

With inputs from agencies

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