Revanth Reddy accuses Centre of blocking foreign guests as Bharat Summit opens in Hyderabad

Telangana Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy said on Friday that the Centre cancelled visas at the last minute for guests and journalists invited to the Bharat Summit, as the two-day conclave opened in Hyderabad. The Ministry of External Affairs has called visa decisions a sovereign function, while the BJP and the BRS have attacked the event as political.

Speaking to the media in Hyderabad on November 13, Revanth Reddy said the summit has brought nearly 1,000 invitees from 70 countries to the city to discuss geopolitics, climate adaptation, infrastructure, investment and democratic institutions. The summit runs on November 13 and 14 and marks 80 years of India’s Independence and the 137th birth anniversary of Jawaharlal Nehru.

What the Chief Minister said

Revanth Reddy’s sharpest charge was aimed at the Prime Minister. He said some journalists who had been granted visas were later stopped from travelling to India, and he tied this to the Union Home Ministry. “Is asking Modiji questions a crime? It is a journalist’s responsibility to ask questions,” he said. “Whether to answer them or not is Modiji’s choice.”

He added that those who asked questions were being kept out because the Prime Minister “likes authoritarianism”, and put a challenge to him: “Our question is, will Modiji lose an election just because someone asks him a question?”

On Rahul Gandhi, who has been invited to give the concluding address, the Chief Minister said the Lok Sabha Leader of the Opposition was coming at the state’s invitation to unveil its targeted gig workers policy and to deliver a national message. “I fail to understand why the BJP finds this problematic,” he said, adding that every earlier Prime Minister had worked with leaders across parties in their own way. He cited Jawaharlal Nehru’s Non-Aligned Movement and Rajiv Gandhi’s decision to include Atal Bihari Vajpayee in an overseas delegation.

He also said suggestions from the summit could shape national policy “once Rahul Gandhi becomes the Prime Minister”.

The visa dispute

The Congress case rests on a count by Lok Sabha member Shashi Tharoor, who has alleged that 115 of 315 speakers cleared by the External Affairs Ministry were refused entry or had visas cancelled, apparently on instructions from the Home Ministry. That figure has not been independently confirmed, and the Centre has not publicly explained the decisions.

One of the named cases is Helle Lyng Svendsen, a Norwegian journalist invited to speak on media freedom, who was asked not to travel shortly before her scheduled departure.

MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal responded to the controversy by saying: “Visa matters are sovereign functions of any country or any government.” The Home Ministry has not publicly explained the individual cases.

Bharat Summit at a glance

• 1,000delegates and experts attending
• 70countries represented
• 115 of 315speakers said by Shashi Tharoor to have been refused entry (unconfirmed)
• December 7 to 9Invest Telangana Global Summit that follows

Opposition attacks and the reply

The summit has been organised by the Congress government in Telangana, and it has drawn a political fight from the start. Union Minister G Kishan Reddy, state BJP president N Ramchander Rao and BRS working president K T Rama Rao, according to the Chief Minister’s account, have called it an “anti-Bharat summit”. Others have argued it brings no benefit to the state and wastes public money.

Revanth Reddy rejected both claims. He described the BJP’s attitude as “dictatorial” and said the BRS had joined the BJP in opposing the event reflexively. The two parties, he said, had also opposed the Musi river rejuvenation, Metro Rail expansion, the Regional Ring Road and the Thummidihatti barrage. “They are not opposing the Congress. They are opposing the people of Telangana,” he said.

He also criticised Kishan Reddy and Bandi Sanjay, the two Union ministers from the state, for skipping the curtain-raiser in Delhi and an all-party meeting on the El Nino situation, saying their absence showed they were not part of Telangana’s interests. Union Minister Piyush Goyal did attend the Delhi curtain-raiser, the Chief Minister noted. Similar curtain-raisers were held in Bengaluru and Chennai, with Mumbai and Ahmedabad planned.

The Chief Minister said the foreign delegates would go home as “brand ambassadors” for Telangana. He denied that the summit was meant to relaunch Rahul Gandhi’s political career, calling the Congress “the soul of India”. He also said the Centre has no initiative to support gig workers, and accused it of favouring Gujarat for investment. “The Government of India and the prime minister are working only for Gujarat,” he said, asking why a facility such as GIFT City is not in Telangana or Andhra Pradesh.

Why it matters for Telangana

For the state, the summit is a rehearsal for a larger investment pitch. The Invest Telangana Global Summit is scheduled for December 7 to 9, and the state government has said the Bharat Summit is meant to show visitors its infrastructure, human resources, climate and the Fortune 500 companies based in the state. No investment figures or commitments from the Bharat Summit have been announced.

For readers outside the conference halls, the immediate stake is the gig workers policy. Telangana plans to unveil a policy for platform workers on Saturday, and Revanth Reddy has argued that the Centre has taken no initiative of its own for them.

Telangana has also been trading blows with the BRS over a looming water shortage. On the sidelines of the summit, the Chief Minister said a water crisis linked to El Nino is coming and that the government had called experts for advice. As our earlier report showed, the state set up a six-minister sub-committee on the problem in October. He accused KTR of hypocrisy for acknowledging the crisis only after months of government warnings, and said KTR was more interested in social media content than in policy.

What happens next

The summit concludes on Saturday, November 14, with Rahul Gandhi’s address and the launch of the Telangana Gig Workers Policy. The Ministry of External Affairs and the Home Ministry have not said whether any of the cancelled visas will be reviewed. The Invest Telangana Global Summit follows from December 7 to 9.