War of tweets erupts over Trudeau’s Indian outfits

Avneet Kaur

Jalandhar, February 24

Social media nowadays has emerged as one of the biggest platforms to share one’s views.

Youngsters these days use hashtags to express their opinions on anything or anybody be it celebrity, festival, policy or any political figure.

However, the debate over Trudeau receiving a cold reception by PM Narendra Modi has not come to an end yet, whereas another debate over Trudeau’s attires has become the talk of the nation. War of tweets has been observed on social media over one or the other reason since Trudeau arrived. The recent one is about his attire. Many news websites have criticised Trudeau for his ‘tacky’ and over the top outfit choices on his first visit to India as Prime Minister.

Meanwhile, many people have also praised his clothing during the first two days of his trip, but after he attended a Bollywood gala night on Tuesday, where he met Shahrukh Khan and other celebrities in red-golden embroidered shervani, the tide completely turned against him and coments started pouring in from twitterati.

From ministers, authors, journalists to ordinary Indians all lined up to mock him, saying his wardrobe was ‘fake and annoying’. On the contrary, Kamaljot Kaur, a local resident said, “Well people have been criticizing Trudeau for his different traditional outfits but I really felt it was his love for the Indian community and culture. Being an Indian and a Sikh, I never wore suit to Golden Temple. However, it was really laudable that being a foreigner, PM’s wife wore suit following the customs of Punjabi culture.”

“Also, Justin Trudeau is no stranger to Indian wear as he has regularly worn it during official celebrations of Diwali and Baiskahi and his picture on the social media is a proof that he does not shy away from donning traditional attires even in Canada,” she added.

“It’s a little over the top, said another resident Poornima, a student, who further shared that, Justin Trudeau arrived here for some purpose to sign deals related to various aspects and strengthen India-Canada ties, so wearing Bollywood-style outfits at every public event was not necessary. What does it say about the real purpose of the visit?”

“There is no restriction over stopping someone over expressing their views. I feel Trudeau was nowhere wrong as donning the attires of other nations is the activity that a person usually does at trips. So there is no need to raise hackles about that.”