Summary: Indian-American technology entrepreneur and academic Vivek Wadhwa writes that India has disappointed some Indian intellectuals in America and the Western media by not producing the revolution they had predicted. After visiting India for nearly three weeks, including at IIT Delhi and IIT Kharagpur, he says people he spoke with were more worried about mundane issues and blocked roads than about protests. He argues that Western coverage, including reports in The Washington Post, kept its premise unexamined despite the failed Tiranga march. Wadhwa also recounts how his 2022 Kashmir observations were refused by several US publications and says he no longer takes their claims of neutrality at face value.
Why it matters: The piece turns the lens on Western commentary about India, showing how prediction can outrun evidence and how distant voices shape the narrative about Bharat. It also offers an outsider’s account of Indian ground realities that contrasts with the West’s desperate bid to manufacture regime change.
Vivek Wadhwa dissects the West’s Bid to Manufacture Regime Change in India
“The revolution that the West is imagining” — Hindustan Times, 19 Oct 2026
India has deeply disappointed some of my Indian intellectual friends in America, as well as the western media, by failing to produce the revolution they had been predicting. When I posted on X about the October 10 protests, saying that everything seemed normal apart from the traffic jams, they attacked me; when the Tiranga protest on October 16 failed to deliver the promised uprising, they merely redoubled their opinions. Apparently, their predictions require less scrutiny than my factual description of what I see.
There’s a large gap between the India I am visiting and the India that I read about in America. I have been here for nearly three weeks, mostly staying at IIT Delhi and IIT Kharagpur, spending time with students and faculty, and talking to people on the streets, in markets, and in hostels.
The people I have spoken with have been more concerned about rising prices and blocked roads than about the protests. Some students knew there was a protest but could not tell me its demands; they gave no sign of planning to overthrow the government…
Read the full article at Hindustan Times →
