TIME releases the 18th Annual list of 100 most influential people: PM Modi, Adar Poonawalla and Mamata Banerjee included are in the list of world leaders.
The global list included US President Joe Biden, India-origin US Vice President Kamala Harris, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Duke and Duchess of Sussex, former President Donald Trump, and co-founder of the Taliban Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, among others. The annual list was unveiled on Wednesday.
Indians in TIME 100 Most Influential 2021
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, and Serum Institute Of India CEO Adar Poonawalla have made it to the list of TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world.
1- Narendra Modi
Indo-American Zakaria accuses PM Modi of ‘veering India away from democracy’
Fareed Zakaria says, in its 74 years as an independent nation, India has had three pivotal leaders, Jawaharlal Nehru, its founding Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, and Narendra Modi, ‘being the third, dominating the country’s politics like no one since them’.he accuses the 70-year-old of ‘mishandling Covid-19’.
Zakaria alleges Modi of pushing the country away from secularism and toward Hindu nationalism, breaking the hope of moving India off its socialist past and into a capitalist future. He holds the leader responsible for “eroding the rights of India’s Muslim minority”, that India has veered away from democracy, toward “electoral democracy”. He questions if that is what Modi wants as his legacy.
2- Mamata Banerjee
Barkha Dutt calls Banerjee ‘the face of fierceness’
Barkha Dutt on Mamata Banerjee’s profile, says “in her signature white sari paired with rubber flip-flops, has become the face of fierceness in Indian politics”. Further calling Narendra Modi ‘seemingly invincible’, she says, Banerjee stood like a fortress against the ‘expansionist ambition’ of the PM on May 2, when she retained her role of Chief Minister of West Bengal in the state’s assembly elections.
She bypassed the money and men of the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party. Working once as a stenographer and a milk-booth vendor to support her family, Mamata has never been someone’s wife, mother, daughter, or partner. She rose from abject poverty.
She says, Mamata herself is the party, she does not lead it. The street-fighter spirit and self-made life in a patriarchal culture set her apart. Mamata is almost certain to be the pivot if any coalition of forces were to come together to counter Modi nationally.
3- Adar Poonawalla
Abhishyat Kidangoor on Adar Poonawalla
Abhishyat Kidangoor writes in Adar Poonawalla’s profile saying, from the beginning of the pandemic, Adar Poonawalla ‘sought to meet the moment’. Calling his company ‘the world’s largest vaccine maker’, his ambition for delivering 1.1 billion doses of Covid-19 vaccines by the end of 2021 was slowed by a fire at his plant in Pune, followed by trouble securing raw materials and a vaccine export ban amid the second wave, leaving many countries stranded, looking out for other sources of the vaccine.
Poonawalla told Kidangoor in March, he didn’t want to “have regrets when history judges my actions.” Poonawalla can still help end the pandemic and delayed immunization in one part of the world can have global consequences- including the risk of more dangerous variants emerging.
The Serum Institute has almost doubled the production of Covid-19 vaccines since May and has added newer vaccines- Novavax and Russia’s Sputnik V. The question is whether he will be able to handle it this time or rather will the world emerge out of this pandemic any sooner?
The global list also had names like tennis player Naomi Osaka, Apple CEO Tim Cook, actor Kate Winslet, and the first African and woman to lead the World Trade Organization Okonjo-Iweala.