Ivanka Trump a ‘rockstar’ in India amid criticism
Ivanka Trump on Nov. 29 pushed business leaders to change their attitudes toward women at an Indian summit where she has drawn mixed reviews amid criticism over her White House role and clothes brand.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s eldest daughter stole the show at the summit in Hyderabad, where Indian officials feted the 36-year-old presidential adviser with a grand reception usually reserved for heads of state.
Trump urged India to seize the untapped potential in women and promoted growing ties between the U.S. and the South Asia powerhouse in a keynote speech on Nov. 28.
She returned to the theme yesterday, stressing businesses needed to stop thinking about gender considerations in the workplace as “women’s issues.”Many attendees at the three-day Global Entrepreneurship Summit embraced her message, including calls for India to boost its woefully low rate of female employment.
“Ivanka Trump has a rockstar quality. She oozes glamour and class,” 19-year-old student Raj Shekhar told AFP.
The visit was clouded by U.S. media reports questioning Trump’s clothing line and its supply chain as well as a snub by Rex Tillerson, the U.S. secretary of state, who has reportedly refused to send senior staff with Trump to India.
Trump had “failed to address the brutal reality (that) clothes and shoes produced by her brand’s suppliers, which outsource all their production overseas, are often manufactured under abusive conditions,” Robert Weissman, head of US-based nonprofit Public Citizen, posted on Twitter.
Others questioned Trump’s credentials to lead such a summit, disapproving of some overt political messaging about her father’s presidency in scripted remarks.
