iNDICA NEWS BUREAU-
The TIME magazine’s list of 100 most influential people for the year 2020 includes Prime Minister Narendra Modi, actor Ayushman Khurrana, Alphabet’s Sundar Pichai, Bilkis, who emerged as the face of the Shaheen Bagh protests and many more India personalities.
PM Modi has been kept under the ‘Leaders’ along with US President Donald Trump, US attorney general William Barr, Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen, US NIAID chief Anthony Fauci and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden and his VP Kamala Harris. The Indian Prime Minister, who turned 70 a few days ago, had also made it to the TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people’s list earlier as well.
Bilkis was an unlikely face among the names who made it to the 100 most influential people’s list. She was among the leading figures who led peaceful protests in Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh area against the Citizenship Amendment Act or CAA last year. The 82-year-old was known for sitting at the protest site from early morning till midnight almost every day for three months until the protests were disbanded due to Covid-19.
Actor Ayushmann Khurana was the only actor from India who made it to the list. Khurrana is the youngest Indian to be featured in this years’ TIME Magazine. He has acted in award-winning movies like “Vicky Donor”, “Shubh Mangal Saavdhan”, “Badhaai Ho”, and “Article 15.”
Besides them, Alphabet’s Pichai, who was featured on one of the eight magazine covers and in the Titans group, and Harris in the Leaders group, biologist Ravindra Gupta was among the Pioneers.
Gupta, who is a professor of clinical microbiology at the Cambridge University, achieved the feat of curing the London Patient Eric Castellijo of human-immunodeficiency virus or the HIV. Castellijo, who is the second person to be functionally cured of HIV wrote of Dr Gupta in the introduction, “Gupta has shared his knowledge and his enthusiasm to find a feasible cure for everyone. He has championed me and empowered me to become an ambassador of hope to millions of people living with HIV around the world.”
Pichai was put into the category of ‘Titans’ along with Miami Heat forward Dwayne Wade, actress Gabrielle Union and Formula One racer Lewis Hamilton among others. Jamie Dimon, chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, said Pichai embodies the real American dream as he emigrated from India as an adult and worked his way up to become the CEO of Alphabet. He said, “(Sundar) represents the best of what we aspire for our society. He used his natural gifts and strong work ethic to rise through the ranks of Google (now Alphabet) by leading many of their most successful products…”
Harris, as written by Massachusetts Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley, has always been a trailblazer. She broke barriers in California, made history in the U.S. Senate, and now she’s the first Black woman and first Indian American to be nominated for vice president by a major political party, Pressley said.
“Kamala’s nomination is the realization of a dream that so many have struggled for so long to make possible,” the congresswoman said. “She was raised by a strong woman rooted in the community to be a strong woman rooted in the community. Her life and career have been defined by a fierce commitment to public service and an abiding belief in government as a force for good,” she adds.
Fifty-four of the people on the list are women, more than ever before. Not only were many of the biggest grassroots movements of the year led by women, so were many of the world’s most effective responses to COVID- 19, TIME said.
As a rule, the TIME 100 focuses on the living, but looming large over this year’s list is the impact of individuals, it adds.
