Prime Minister Narendra Modi is leading the Internatioanal Yoga Day celebrations with foreign dignitaries, bureaucrats and members of the Indian diaspora at the United Nations Secretariat in New York on Wednesday.
The Prime Minister will also meet business heads and attend a diaspora event. In the meanwhile about today’s Yoga event, it was nine years ago, India successfully convinced the United Nations to designate June 21 as International Yoga Day.
Since then, Modi has harnessed yoga as a cultural soft power to stretch his nation’s diplomatic reach and flex his country’s rising place in the world. Now, Modi is guiding leaders from around the world in the practice of yoga to promote its benefits as part of his three-day visit to the US.
Modi said that “Yoga means to unite, so your coming here together is another form of yoga.” Modi had first proposed the concept of a Yoga Day during his address at the 69th session of the UN General Assembly in 2014. All members of the UN later agreed to observe International Yoga Day. The event was first observed on June 21, 2015, and has since then been a global phenomenon.
