INDIAN PM MEET FIJI PM IN SUVA, FIJI
This is really historic both for Fiji and India, keeping in mind that Fiji is rooted in the Indian history due in main for the indentured laborers who were taken to Fiji by the British more than 200 years ago.
Mr. Modi Meets Fiji PM Bainimarama
It is a credit to Mr. Modi that he did not forget the Indians in Fiji on becoming PM of the largest democracy in the world. Credit also are due top Fiji PM Bainimarama who has risen above racism and any anti-Indian sentiments that paved the way to several military coups in Fiji the first of which distanced India and Fiji for over 20 years.
Unlike other military coups in Fiji, Bainimarama-led coup was not race-based. He had an enormous task to prove point in the face international ridicule and boycott by his immediate neighbors Australia and New Zealand who instead of helping him rebuild a torn Fiji only flared and stifled with the domestic affairs of Fiji.
Modi’s visit tp Fiji and a warm welcome he got by the Bainimarama government sends a timely signals to all that relationship of Indian and Fiji are on stronger grounds if here to stay for ever.
(M H Koya PhD)