Triangular tale of 2 warm hugs

Between the hug that Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave Vladimir Putin in Moscow on July 9 and the one he gave Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelenskyy on Thursday, August 23, lies the story of India's balancing act on a war in which India has refused to take sides, despite immense pressure to do so.

- V Sudarshan

The United States made no effort to conceal its unhappiness over Prime Minister Modi jetting off to Moscow to give his "dear friend Putin" a bear hug even as the Biden Administration was busy commemorating the 75th anniversary of NATO's founding. The Americans had been trying to get Modi to put the trip off, if nothing else. Call it the exigencies of war or a signal of sorts, but the day Modi landed, Russians bombed at school in Ukraine that took 37 lives, including three children, and injuring 173 others. Zelenskyy minced no words when he said, "It is a huge disappointment and a devastating blow to peace efforts to see the leader of the world's largest democracy hug the world's most bloody criminal in Moscow on such a day. Modi was constrained to deliver a lecture to his dear friend Putin. But lectures, as we know, world! leaders, take in their stride, even as they move on.

In Delhi, a peeved American Ambassador Eric Garcetti read out the riot act saying that New Delhi should not take Washington "for granted", at signal suggesting that New Delhi could not afford to stay non-aligned on this.