Modi mocked for ‘manufactured’ New Year’s Day interview with India press agency
- PM has not held a press conference since being elected in 2014 and the encounter was likened to the leader quizzing himself
India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, has been accused of being afraid of the media, after consenting to a rare interview – just one of a handful in four years as PM – on New Year’s Day in which he answered a range of questions that critics compared to “free-hit deliveries” in cricket.
The interview, to news agency Asian News International or ANI, attracted widespread comment and a fair amount of ridicule. Some journalists called it “manufactured”, “scripted” and a “monologue”.
The Congress party called it “fixed”. One MP said the questions put to Modi “were more in the nature of feeding rather than grilling the prime minister”. A cartoon showed Modi interviewing himself.
The Indian media have been fretting about lack of access to Modi ever since he assumed office in 2014.
He has not held a single press conference. The handful of interviews have been mostly set pieces in which the interviewer has failed to put difficult questions or challenged Modi on his answers.