Donald Trump faced some serious difficulty in pronouncing the names of two of India’s greatest sportsman during his welcome speech on Monday.
Trump began his 36-hour trip to India by addressing 100,000 Indians at the “Namaste Trump” rally at the Sardar Patel Stadium in Ahmedabad, the world’s largest cricket stadium.
In his speech, Trump praised the Bollywood movie industry, mentioning the classic films “DDLJ” and “Sholay.”
However, he had some trouble name-checking former Indian test cricket captain Sachin Tendulkar and current captain Virat Kohli.
“Your people cheer on some of the greatest cricket players, from Sachin Tendulkar to Virat Kohli, the greatest in the world,” Trump said, to wild cheers.
Something about Donald Trump's pronunciation of Sachin Tendulkar tells me he isn't a huge cricket fan pic.twitter.com/stFhq46MLx [1]
— Andy Silke (@andysilke) February 24, 2020 [2]
Moments before, Trump had quoted the Hindu monk Swami Vivekananda, but gave up half way through trying to pronounce his name and laughed it off.
“As the great religious teacher Swami Vive..kamun…nund once said, ‘the moment I stand in reverence before every human being and see God in him, that moment I am free’,” Trump said.
Some extremely high-risk reading by Trump during his speech in India pic.twitter.com/3xxyVZUsAm [3]
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 24, 2020 [4]
Trump, traveling with his wife Melania, visited the Taj Mahal later on Monday.
He is scheduled to meet Indian president Ram Nath Kovind and prime minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday.
India probably reveres cricket more than any other nation in the world, and its national players are treated like royalty.
Tendulkar himself holds several international records, and is widely considered the greatest batsman of the modern era. Kholi is currently the number one rated test batsman in the world.
Donald Trump just called Sachin Tendulkar as "Soo Chin tendulkar"
LMAOđ— Darpit Kunder (@darpit_kunder) February 24, 2020 [5]
âWhat an embarrassment,â wrote another person [6] in reaction to the footage.
Many others noted Trump’s embarrassing pronunciation of names.
#TrumpInIndia [7] #TrumpIndiaVisit [8] #TrumpModiMeet [9] #SachinTendulkar [10] #swamivivekananda [11] #chaiwala [12] #meme [13] pic.twitter.com/0yH8OIDEHW [14]
— Sir Ravinder Jadeja (@SirJadeja7) February 24, 2020 [15]
Oh for fu… pic.twitter.com/9ksnuRzBzu [16]
— Greg James (@gregjames) February 24, 2020 [17]
There's folks saying it was okay for Trump to mispronounce the names of almost half a dozen people because he said Radical Islamic Terror correctly. I can't even tell if these people are serious anymore.
— Dredgen Rickinald (@ly0nardo) February 24, 2020 [18]
BBCâs Rajini Vaidyanathan reported that crowds began leaving midway through Trumpâs speech, which came after Modi spoke.