U.S. professors protest Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Silicon Valley visit
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi ahead of his visit to Silicon Valley and warned U.S. technology executives against supporting his Digital India initiative.
A letter sent last week to leaders of Silicon Valley tech companies said Modi’s initiative — which seeks to expand Internet access and develop online tools to improve government performance — lacks adequate privacy protections and could impinge on Indians’ rights.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi ahead of his visit to Silicon Valley and warned U.S. technology executives against supporting his Digital India initiative.
A letter sent last week to leaders of Silicon Valley tech companies said Modi’s initiative — which seeks to expand Internet access and develop online tools to improve government performance — lacks adequate privacy protections and could impinge on Indians’ rights.
While Modi has not been charged with wrongdoing in the Gujarat violence, the state’s high court will hear a case this month that accuses Modi and his state security services of failing to suppress the pogroms.
The letter was signed by scores of professors, mainly liberal arts scholars and South Asia specialists at universities, including Harvard, Stanford and USC. Among them is Wendy Doniger, a University of Chicago divinity professor whose recent book on Hinduism was taken off the shelves in India because religious conservatives objected to her account of the country’s dominant faith.
It is not the first time U.S. academics have expressed concerns over Modi’s record. In 2013, Indian American faculty members at the University of Pennsylvania led an effort to cancel a speech Modi was scheduled to give by video at a conference hosted by the prestigious Wharton business school.
Two English professors who helped spearhead that drive, Ania Loomba and Suvir Kaul, also signed the letter sent