159. Will not Indian Passport’s world ranking fall with the Kashmir bifurcation? P S Remesh Chandran

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Will not Indian Passport’s world ranking fall with the Kashmir bifurcation?

P. S. Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

Article Title Image 1 By Skipp604. Graphics: Adobe SP.

Does who travels with it decide the higher or lower value ranking of the Indian Passport?

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Global passport ranking is simply the figure arrived at by adding the number of countries you can travel with a country’s passport with no visa and with visa on arrival. The highest this figure, the more powerful and strong is the passport. The positions of a few countries as on the 07th of August 2019 is shown here:

The passport of the United Arab Emirates is the highest- a 167 score. With an UAE passport you can travel 113 countries with No Visa and 54 countries with Visa On Arrival. UAE, Singapore, Germany, Finland and Denmark are the first five. Sweden, France, Italy, Luxembourg and Spain are the next five. USA was the 14th strong. India is the 140th country in this list of 199 countries, with a 65 score with 25 countries needing No Visa and 40 countries needing Visa On Arrival to travel. Iran is the 192nd country in this list of 199 countries, with a 42 score with 12 countries needing No Visa and 30 countries needing Visa On Arrival to travel. If we are not blind, we can see that India’s passport is not moving towards the status and ranking allocated to respected democratic countries but to the lowest position of theocratic countries, countries with no democracy and countries with religious fundamentalism.

2

When Mr. Narendra Modi told press in an interview in 2018 ‘I don’t think earlier anybody experienced the strength of Indian passport’, he meant his Prime Minister’s diplomatic passport, not the common man’s ordinary passport. Moreover, he must have remembered his experiences of traveling with his personal passport before he became a prime minister when he was denied visa to land in the United States. When he made this statement to press, he did not base his statement on any facts. Actually, during his rule, the Indian passport which already was standing at the bottom level in world ranking did not benefit any from his rule but was undergoing the worst hit at that time. The Indian passport’s standing became worse during his rule and more countries began to insist pre-approved visas for Indian travelers.

Article Title Image 2 By Skipp604. Graphics: Adobe SP.

This particular score was based on the Henley & Partners Visa Restrictions Index, which analyzes and ranks 104 countries by the number of other countries that their citizens can travel to without a visa, using the world’s largest database of travel information published annually and maintained by the International Air Transport Association (IATA). There are other rankings with other indices which, in addition to no visa countries include countries that their citizens can travel to with visa on arrival issued under bilateral treaties and agreements where also the rankings of the Indian passport is very poor which only worsened during BJP’s rule.

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India’s score in 2013 was 52 and ranked 74th which in 2018 came down to score 49 and rank 86. During February 2019 this improved. Why? Because India’s Parliament elections were declared and the world thought the theocratic BJP will loose and the democratic Congress will be elected again to power. The following is the score and ranking year wise:

Year Score Rank

2013 52......74
2014 52......76
2015 51......84
2016 52......85
2017 49......87
2018 49......86

After the elections when Congress apparently lost and BJP came to power again, the score further went down to 40 by July last of 2019. The world is waiting to see what the score will be after BJP government’s rape of democracy in Kashmir is acknowledged by the world.

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India has around 14 percent of the UN-represented population. India’s democracy was considered one of the worlds consistent ones even though, compared to flawless, fine or less wily a few other democracies ranking far higher in world democracy rankings, considered crude and corrupt. India’s constitution was respected and valued high by the world. Still, India’s passport had only a 78th position in cross-country travelling. This was the position even before a few years. Today, after the introduction of electronic voting machines and the world-widespread news of alleged wholesale manipulation of voting machines and rigging of elections in India, India’s democracy is loosing esteem in the eyes of the world. It is even believed by the world that India’s democracy was sabotaged and step by step under BJP India is moving towards a Hindu theocracy like the Islamic theocracy in Iran, the only difference being while in Iran other castes in Islam are killed, in India the Islamists are killed. Today the world is also learning that the original constitution of India which they respected and valued is no more respected even in India by even the ruling party, is amended daily to suit personal purposes, and exist no more in original. These discreditable events which happened during the months from March to the August of 2019 may be invisible to the blind eyes of the Indians but the world’s eyes are open and they can see them. Who said these events in India are not affecting the status of its passport?

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In passport ranking, India’s position is worse than Uganda, Morocco, Mongolia and Ghana, and only slightly better than Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast and Senegal. Why are Iran the 192nd and Pakistan the 197th in a list of 199 countries in passport ranking? It’s because they are countries acknowledged as religious theocracies and cannot be trusted like democracies. Why is India which is constantly telling its people it is the fifth or seventh largest economy in the world and is a very strong financial power to reckon with is only the 140th in this list as on August 2019? It’s because the world understands its democracy is failing and it’s moving towards a fundamentally religious theocracy like Iran and Pakistan which cannot be trusted. How unfortunate for Indians to travel abroad!

Article Title Image 3 By Katy Veldhorst. Graphics: Adobe SP.

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The Irish Mirror on 28 April 2018 reported that ‘a Latvian-born Irish citizen from Dublin, Liga Skromane (33), while traveling as tourist was strangled to death in India, and that her decapitated body was found hanging from a tree at a remote mangrove forest near the secluded Vazhamuttom, close to the famous tourist haven, the Kovalam beach of Trivandrum, Kerala, an area frequented by drug peddlers and addicts. She was snatched from a nearby beach and ferried by fiber boat before being raped and strangled to death. There were blood clots in her brain and bruises on the neck and the legs.’ Her husband flew from Dublin and told press that he was highly dissatisfied with the Kerala Police’s working and was going to make a film to show the world how unsafe for women India is for traveling. Every newspaper and television channel in the world reported this rape and murder. That is one crown for the Indian passport’s world ranking!

https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/liga-skromane-33-strangled-death-12445753

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The famous Forbes Magazine in their article ‘20 Most Dangerous Places For Women Travelers’ published on 26 July 2919 and viewed by 1,63,538 people within seven days and counting, recorded India as the most dangerous place for women travellers. The list is here: 1. South Africa, 2. Brazil, 3. Russia, 4. Mexico, 5. Iran, 6. Dominican Republic, 7. Egypt, 8. Morocco, 9. India, 10. Thailand, 11. Malaysia, 12. Saudi Arabia, 13. Turkey, 14. Argentina, 15. Chile, 16. Cambodia, 17. Bahrain, 18. Tunisia, 19. United States, 20. Ukraine. South Africa tops first and India 9th. India scored the worst in gender inequality and gender gap also. The meaning is clear: never travel to these countries, which soon will also mean: never receive people from these countries! A kudos for the Indian passport indeed!

It’s only contextual here to note the five countries safest for women to travel according to this list: 1. Spain, 2. Singapore, 3. Ireland, 4. Austria, and 5. Switzerland.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurabegleybloom/2019/07/26/20-most-dangerous-places-for-women-travelers/

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Not only the Indian Judiciary, Government, Foreign Ministry and police forces but their representatives in the Consulates and Embassies abroad were shaken when the Gulf News on 04 August 2019 reported that a US woman, Jennipha-Lauren Nielsen, posted a video on Facebook on July 30 in which she alleged the Indian legal system corrupt, questioned the Delhi High Court’s decision to grant bail and suspended the seven-year sentence of a man convicted for raping her in India, and the people in the Indian Consulate in San Francisco denying help to rape victims. She made this video standing outside the Consulate General of India in San Fransisco just after coming out after a row. The video caused a stir on social media and went viral, and the social media instantly responded with #NoBailToRapists tags.

She said she had to travel to India alone to testify in the court, the man was given bail by a corrupt judge, she now has to take the case for appeal to the Supreme Court of India, criticized the Indian bureaucracy as corrupt as the consulate told her to go to the Indian consulate in Sacramento, California. ‘India’s incredible corruption and lack of support for women that are attacked is continuing. They refuse to help me yet they say that they want to stop the violence against women in their own country. They want me to spend thousands of dollars to travel to the state of California on my own money because they have let a convicted criminal out on bail. We don’t give bail to convicted criminals.’

This US national was sexually assaulted in South Delhi in 2013 by the nephew of a former Delhi mayor while staying at a rented flat with her husband. The victim had to come all the way from her country for giving deposition in the case. Rajeev Panwar, the accused, was sentenced for a seven year imprisonment in February 2019 by a Delhi trial court. On 05 July 2019 the Delhi High Court granted him bail and suspended his sentence. They thought she was a citizen of a far distant land on the other side of the world and will not ever learn about this legal juggernaut again! So it was another quill for the status of the Indian passport!

https://gulfnews.com/world/americas/viral-video-us-woman-angry-over-her-rapist-getting-bail-in-india-1.65629038

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There is now even a new Women’s Danger Index, ranking the world’s most dangerous countries for women travelling alone. These rankings are based on such factors as street safety for women, intentional homicide of women, sexual violence, legal discrimination, global gender gap, gender inequality index and attitude of government, bureaucracy and people towards violence against women- a very fearsome list of indices for countries such as India indeed!

Article Title Image 4 By Agus Dietrich. Graphics: Adobe SP.

More English articles by the author at:  
http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.com/
 
Malayalam articles by the author at: http://sahyadrimalayalam.blogspot.in/
 
More political article by the author here: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.com/p/list-of-political-articles.html 

About the Author P. S. Remesh Chandran:

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of Swan: The Intelligent Picture Book. Born and brought up in the beautiful village of Nanniyode in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Trivandrum, in Kerala. Father British Council trained English teacher and Mother University educated. Matriculation with distinction and Pre Degree Studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship. Discontinued Diploma studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

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Post: P. S. Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books, Trivandrum, Padmalayam, Nanniyode, Pacha Post, Trivandrum- 695562, Kerala State, South India.

Tags:

Global Passport Ranking, Visa On Arrival, No Visa Countries, Visa Denial, Strong Passport, Indian Passport, Pre Approved Visa, India Travel, India News Politics, Cross Country Travel, Kashmir, IATA, // BJP Rule, Global Gender Gap, Democracy Ranking, Gender Inequality Index, Womens Danger Index, Henley Index, Safe Countries For Women, Indian Legal System, Consulate General India, Indian Bureaucracy, Street Safety For Women, Legal Discrimination, Voting Machines, Rigging Elections, Indian Democracy, Diplomatic Passports, Democratic Theocratic Countries, Hindu Islamic Theocracy, Religious Fundamentalism,

First published on : Published on September 8, 2019