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With the state visit of the Indian Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modiji, earlier this month, we witnessed the elevation of the India-New Zealand bilateral ties to a Strategic Partnership, backed by a Roadmap to 2030, focusing on maritime security, and defense collaboration, including Counterterrorism.
The date of arrival of Modiji in Auckland, July 10, 2026, was also the 41st anniversary of the Rainbow Warrior bombing in Marsden Harbour. The then Prime Minister, the iconic Rt. Hon. David Lange, labeled the attack as a “a sordid act of international state-backed terrorism” and an unprecedented violation of national sovereignty. Incidentally, Marsden Wharf is less than a kilometer away from Spark Arena, the venue of the “Kia Ora Modi” event. It is worthwhile remembering that the New Zealand High Commission in New Delhi was reopened under Rt. Hon. David Lange, after his predecessor shut it, and invited his Indian counterpart in 1986 to visit New Zealand. This was followed by phases of trust, and skepticism, before the next state visit, four decades later, as India and New Zealand arise and assert as more confident, influential democracies in an increasingly volatile global geopolitical environment.
Meanwhile, the world saw the rise of the World-Wide-Web and the dot-com-boom, and the scourge of transnational violent extremism, especially in the 21st century. I grew up in the Indian Republic, and I was in Pune when the Mumbai 26/11 terror attack happened, and I was in Mumbai when the 2010 Pune terror attack happened. I was in Hyderabad when the Mumbai 11/7 terror attack happened and was in Mumbai when the Hyderabad terror attack happened in 2007. However, I was in Auckland when the September 3, 2021, terror attack shook Auckland, shattering my myth that New Zealand is immune from violent extremist threats targeting everyday civilians.
While the then-Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. Dr. Dame Jacinda Ardern, labeled it for what it was, a terrorist attack motivated by xenophobic religious fundamentalism, the mainstream media, with a right-wing bias, tried to re-report it in July 2026 as an act “triggered” by a “pattern of obsessive stalking”, with a subtle narrative to gaslight South Asian men (and predominantly Hindu cisgendered men) as culturally aggressive. We also saw people, with no connection to the Indian Republic, especially voices claiming to represent feminist groups, openly tried to shield (and subtly justify) the April 22, 2025, terror attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir, India. This is part of a pattern of a wider observation where people with no affiliation to India, seem to vent out their Hinduphobic biases by targeting Hindu civilians in New Zealand, using India’s domestic politics as a dogwhistle. Ditto with the transnational threats and the recurring, emphasized mischief targeting Hindu public cultural celebrations. I share my Auckland Central neighborhood with two hundred beautiful different cultures, and I stand by my observations about targeted Hinduphobia.
I was privileged to visit Marsden Venue on the 40th anniversary of the attack in 2025, and get onboard the Rainbow Warrior, docked at Auckland Harbour on that occasion. The Rainbow Warrior continues to sail high, symbolizing our galvanized resilience, and an optimism for a world united against shared threats. As we approach the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, I wish to remind our Kiwi-Hindu community that it was everyday Aucklanders then, who played a critical role to get the perpetrators caught. Fast-forward 2026, I am honored to be a part of local neighborhood patrol teams around Marsden Wharf.
We ought to bequeath a safe, thriving New Zealand in a nuclear-free South Pacific, to our future generations, and identify recurring threats to our shared, secure future in mainstream New Zealand, including and especially Hinduphobia, domestic or transnational. Regardless of your identity or affiliation, if you claim that “caste-system is evil”, you are subtly justifying targeted Hinduphobia, and by extension, playing into a sinister narrative which shielded the Pahalgam attack. Lest we forget.-by CVR Shastri