London Diary: Of Trump triumph & Modi bombshell

The Donald Trump victory created as many ripples in the UK, as in the US — and already the political fallout is breaking up the right-wingers. Who would have thought that even the Conservatives are facing problems, as almost all factions of the party appear to have a different point of view? To begin with, Prime Minister Theresa May looked uncertain about how to deal with a Trump ascendancy — and she lost the momentum to Nigel Farage who was quick off the mark, and actually flew to the US to meet the President-elect. There were photo-ops galore, and now we have Boris Johnson, another Brexiteer, putting in a word of support for Mr Trump’s foreign policy announcement about Europe footing the Nato bill. Mr Trump and the EU have little love lost between them, and since the UK is still reeling under Brexit, it can hardly complain. Besides, there have been so many comparisons between the the Brexit vote and the American elections. In both cases an increasing nationalism and anti-immigrant stance has been noticeable. But to be honest, this time around, at least in our household we knew (albeit, with gloom) that Mr Trump was on his way, because Meghnad had already predicted it. And so I have to say I was luckier than most as I had months to get used to the idea!

One bombshell that almost completely wiped off Prime Minister Theresa May’s visit to India from all conversation was Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement of withdrawing the old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes from the market. And to be honest, that news has spread far and wide. The reverberations were being felt by those who had exchanged pounds for rupees to holiday in India, and for those from India who wanted to change money to come to London! Whilst we were briefly in Dubai and Singapore this week, this was a topic of conversation everywhere, even in the newspapers, which reported that the local money changers had run out of acceptable cash. In Singapore, our Chinese-origin taxi driver could not stop chortling over the move. He said that all his Indian clients had become fans of Mr Modi. As this global impact of this changeover is assessed, it is undoubtedly also a historical moment when the world is looking at India and understanding, at last, the importance of turning vast reserves of money sloshing around into accountable transactions.