*NEW DELHI: *Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met India’s corporatetitans on Tuesday as he pursued a tour of the country marred by reports hehas been snubbed by political leaders.
Trudeau addressed a business conference in Mumbai on Tuesday morning,attended by leaders from the Tata conglomerate, IT giants Infosys andpharmaceutical major Jubilant Life Sciences.
But Indian and Canadian media said Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi hassidestepped his Canadian counterpart over the Trudeau administration’sperceived support for Sikh separatists and dealings with Sikh groups inCanada.
Canada is home to roughly half a million Sikhs and a significant numberappear to back a decades-long Sikh campaign in India’s northern Punjabstate for an independent homeland of Khalistan.
Trudeau was received by a junior minister when he arrived at New Delhiairport on Saturday and by district officials when he visited the historicTaj Mahal monument in Agra the next day.
Modi often meets leading heads of government at the airport with bear hugsand cheerful photo-ops.
He was again missing however when Trudeau visited Modi’s home state ofGujarat on Monday.
The social media-savvy Modi, who has 40.4 million Twitter followers, isalso yet to tweet a welcome message to Trudeau as he does customarily forother leaders.
The nationalist Hindu premier shared a photo of himself meeting withIranian President Hassan Rouhani the same day that Trudeau landed.
“The Khalistan issue, which has kept India-Canada ties on ice through threedecades from 1980, has resurfaced, taking away much of the warmth” duringTrudeau’s visit, the Hindu daily said Tuesday.
An Indian government source denied there was a snub in comments reported byseveral media outlets.
But Candice Malcolm, a columnist for the Toronto Sun newspaper, insistedthat Trudeau has been given the “cold shoulder” by the Indian government.
India accuses Canadian administrations of backing separatist groupsalthough Canada’s Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan, a Sikh, has publiclydenied that his community was sympathetic to the Khalistan cause.
All four of Trudeau’s Indian-Canadian ministers are of Sikh origin.
Last April, Trudeau attended a Khalsa Day parade where Sikh militants whowere killed in a bloody siege at Amritsar’s Golden Temple in 1984 werehailed as heroes.
Trudeau, who is to meet with Modi in New Delhi on Friday, will go to seethe Golden Temple, the Sikhs’ holiest shrine, on Wednesday.
Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh said he was looking forward tomeeting Trudeau after reports initially suggested he would skip themeeting. He failed to meet Sajjan when the Canadian minister visited thestate last year.
Amrik Singh, who heads the UK-based Sikh Federation, a political group,accused India of giving Trudeau a cold reception because he was a closeally of Sikhs.
“This is showing India’s discomfort with the Canadian PM for having Sikhsin his cabinet who the Indian authorities are paranoid about.” – APP / AFP