In Egypt, PM Modi discusses trade, investment; to meet El-Sisi today

PM Narendra Modi arrives in Cairo, Saturday. Egyptian PM Mostafa Madbouly received him at the airport. PTI

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is currently on his first State visit to Egypt, will meet President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi on Sunday. The two leaders had decided to elevate the relationship to the level of strategic partnership during El-Sisi’s visit to India as the chief guest at the Republic Day celebrations this year.

Modi’s first official engagement in the country on Saturday was a meeting with the India Unit, a group of high-level ministers constituted by El-Sisi in March to enhance India-Egypt relations. Seven members of the Egyptian Cabinet, led by Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly, were also present during the discussions on deepening trade relations and strengthening the strategic partnership between the two countries.

    Advancing 🇮🇳-🇪🇬 civilisational relations!

“Discussions focused on deepening cooperation across a range of areas including trade & investment, renewable energy, green hydrogen, IT, digital payment platforms, pharma and people to people ties,” External Affairs Ministry spokesman Arindam Bagchi said on Twitter.

This is the first bilateral visit by an Indian Prime Minister to Egypt in 26 years.

On Saturday, Modi also met the Grand Mufti of Egypt Dr Shawki Ibrahim Abdel-Karim Allam and interacted with the members of the Indian diaspora and the Bohra community.

The meeting with Bohra community came ahead of his visit to Cairo’s historic Al-Hakim Mosque scheduled for Sunday. The Mosque has been restored with the efforts of India’s Dawoodi Bohra community, which has been consistently involved with the renovation since the 1970s.

Modi will also visit the Heliopolis War Cemetery to pay respects to the Indian troops who gave their lives in the ultimate act of valour for Egypt during World War-1. This memorial was built by the Commonwealth, although it is dedicated to the 3,799 Indian troops who lost their lives in different First World War conflicts in Egypt.

Earlier, in a special gesture, Modi was welcomed at the Cairo airport by Madbouly with a warm embrace, and accorded a ceremonial welcome and a Guard of Honour.

    Landed in Cairo. I am confident this visit will strengthen India’s ties with Egypt. I look forward to talks with President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and attending other programmes. pic.twitter.com/a4j0Ylzc3i

    — Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) June 24, 2023

“I am confident this visit will strengthen India’s ties with Egypt. I look forward to talks with President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and attending other programmes,” Prime Minister Modi tweeted after landing in Cairo.

Earlier, the Indian diaspora, dressed up in traditional attire, gathered in large numbers at the Ritz Carlton Hotel here to welcome Modi.

Waving the Indian Tricolour, members of the Indian community, dressed in traditional attire, welcomed the Prime Minister to chants of ‘Modi, Modi’ and ‘Vande Mataram’ when he reached the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Cairo.

An Egyptian woman, Jena, dressed in a saree, greeted Modi with the popular song ‘Yeh Dosti Hum Nahi Chhodenge’ from the movie Sholay. Impressed by the rendition of the Kishore Kumar-Manna Dey number, the Prime Minister expressed surprise when Jena said she knew very little Hindi and had never visited India.

“Kisi ko pata bhi nahi chalega ki aap Misr ki beti ho ya Hindustan ki beti ho (Nobody will be able to tell whether you are a daughter of Egypt or a daughter of India),” Prime Minister Modi said.

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NCP power play: Chhagan Bhujbal’s OBC bouncer now queers Ajit Pawar’s pitch

In the wheels within wheels of the NCP’s power games, Chhagan Bhujbal now has put in a spoke. Soon after Ajit Pawar suggested that he wanted a role in the party organisation, taken to mean the Maharashtra NCP chief’s post, Bhujbal said that the new head of the party in the state should be an OBC.

Bhujbal is himself an OBC leader, and a strong advocate of the group’s cause, and hence one view is that he was putting his name forward. The other view, keeping in mind how NCP supremo Sharad Pawar has proved one step ahead of Ajit at all times, is that Bhujbal was acting on the old warhorse’s behalf to scuttle the nephew’s chances.

From every side one looks at it, Bhujbal’s call has a lot of merit. The NCP has not been able to shrug off the image of being a pro-Maratha party even 24 years after it was formed, with most of its top leadership belonging to the community. The OBCs form a 40% chunk of Maharashtra’s population, bigger than the Marathas at 33%. Every party is wooing the OBC vote, with both the Congress’s state chief (Nana Patole) and the BJP’s (Chandrashekhar Bawankule) being OBC. And Bhujbal himself has earned his stripes as an OBC leader, with his long years spent in politics and his vociferous articulation of the OBC cause.

His impatience for a larger role in the NCP barely hidden now, Ajit played his latest move at the party conclave held in Mumbai earlier this week, in the presence of Sharad Pawar. Days after the NCP supremo had unveiled his succession plan, with Supriya Sule and Praful Patel as working presidents, and no word on Ajit, the latter said: “I was never keen on Leader of the Opposition role (in the Assembly). I accepted it because of a signature campaign by the party’s MLAs… I am willing to give up the post… I will be more happy to work for the organisation.”

While Ajit added, “Give me any role”, few were left in doubt about what the NCP leader wanted. With Sule’s position clarified as the national face, Ajit was signalling that the Maharashtra unit should finally be left to him to run. Incidentally, among the states Sule has been given charge of is Maharashtra.

Days later, Bhujbal, known for his blunt speaking, cautioned the NCP about keeping in mind “social engineering”. “If you have a Maratha as LoP, the state party president should be from the OBC,” he said.

Bhujbal added: “I would also like to work as state president. Else, there are many OBC leaders in the party — Sunil Tatkare, Jitendra Awhad, Dhananjay Munde — who can be considered.”

The tenure of the current NCP Maharashtra president, Jayant Patil, has already crossed five years. And the party would be keen to strike the right caste balance in time for the 2024 Lok Sabha and Assembly elections.

From Sharad Pawar’s perspective, having Ajit as Maharashtra president could also open a constant source of friction between him and Sule, as the state in-charge, over issues such as candidates for polls. Ajit and Sule have long been seen as contenders for Pawar Senior’s legacy, with the matter now seemingly settled in favour of the daughter.

In his statement, Bhujbal suggested that Sharad Pawar was also a big believer in social engineering and that his call for an OBC state president was only in the NCP’s interests. “We already have Marathas holding important posts. An OBC state president would help strike social balance and send a positive message to the community.”

A senior NCP leader backed Bhujbal, saying: “What he said has logic. His politics has centred around OBCs. Why should we suspect his suggestion?”

A versatile leader known for his oratorial skills, who has been with the NCP right from the start, was the party’s first Maharashtra president, and who has bounced back after long imprisonment on corruption charges, Bhujbal’s is a voice that can’t be ignored.

Recently, he said almost the impossible by questioning the rationale behind putting up Saraswati portraits in schools, suggesting that she was a Goddess of the upper castes who deprived communities such as OBCs of education.

He is also the founder and head of a socio-political outfit called the Akhil Bharatiya Mahatma Phule Samata Parishad, which champions the cause of OBCs at the national level.

While Bhujbal started out with the Shiv Sena in the 1960s, impressing the leadership with his skills as both a street fighter and a legislator, he quit the party over its opposition to reservation for OBCs. As Leader of the Opposition, Bhujbal was known to take on Bal Thackeray when the Sena was at its peak.

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