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Narendra Modi postpones his visit to Britain |
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Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi has postponed his trip to Britain to avoid a possible law and order problem in that country. It was officially announced in Gandhi Nagar that the Chief Minister had received a call from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil advising him not to go to UK in view of possible law and order problems. The Centre had received a communication to this effect from London. There was also the possibility of a terrorist attack.
The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), however, later issued a clarification that Manmohan Singh did not call up Narendra Modi. It was the Home Minister who did so. According to PMO spokesman, Modi had accepted the Union Home Minister’s advice and called up the Prime Minister to inform him about the cancellation of his visit to UK.
Narendra Modi was scheduled to leave for London on March 25 to attend Gujarat Day celebrations and address a meeting of Non- Resident Indians. Human Rights Organisations had threatened to stage demonstrations if Narendra Modi visited that country. During his visit to UK in 2003, the Gujarat Chief Minister had to face noisy protests from demonstrators protesting against his handling of the post-Godhra situation in Gujarat. There are also reports that Asian Human Rights Activists were trying to obtain an Arrest Warrant for Narendra Modi if he went ahead with his planned visit to Britain. Suresh Grover of the Monitoring Group and Amaaz, two organizations spearheading the protest against Modi’s visit, said, they were making all efforts to have him arrested for torture under the British Criminal Justice Act.
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