G20 success, women’s reservation bill draws India accolades in New York
Hindustan TimesNew York: When external affairs minister S Jaishankar stepped into a meeting room on the fourth floor of the Lotte Palace Hotel in New York to attend the India-Brazil-South Africa ministerial on Friday, he explained to his counterparts why he had arrived in the city just that morning. After hearing him, South Africa’s minister of international relations and cooperation, Naledi Pandor said that was a very “progressive step” by India and congratulated Jaishankar. If it was the women’s reservation bill that drew India accolades on one end — the issue also came up in Jaishankar’s conversation with Australian foreign minister Penny Wong — it was the success of the G20 summit under the Indian presidency that was a talking point on the other. When the UK’s minister of state for South Asia Tariq Ahmad stepped into the Kennedy Room in the same hotel to meet Jaishankar, he began by congratulating India for G20. Even as discussions around Canada’s allegations against India have dominated the headlines — and it is indeed a big talking point across the world of diplomacy in New York — India’s brand is also defined by other issues.