Modi Effect: Wharton Loses Main Sponsor Gautam Adani

The student organising body was extremely impressed with Modi's credentials, governance ideologies, and leadership, which was the primary reason for his invitation, the statement said.

"However, as a responsible student body within the University of Pennsylvania, we must consider the impact on multiple stakeholders in our ecosystem," the organising committee explained.

"Mr Modi's keynote address at Wharton India Economic Forum has been cancelled," the Wharton India Economic Forum said in a statement, which was welcomed by the organisers of the petition campaign.

"I think one of the things that concerns us and continues to be is an attempt by a number of folks from his (Modi's) camp as well as some camps in the business community trying to differentiate and distinguish between his economic policies versus his human rights records," Toorjo Ghosh, assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, one of the three professors, said.

"We believe that the two are absolutely connected and that is the reason why Gujarat has developed in a way it has," he said.

Ghosh, who besides his teaching, works among the poor and slums in India.

Having got what he wanted, Ghosh said he and his team would continue to "expose" Modi.

"I think it is important to keep talking about what development is. The model that Narendra Modi has put forward is seriously flawed and is based on some extremely egregious flouting of human rights. That is his economic model," Ghosh said.

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