The President of Russia reached Delhi on Thursday evening on a two-day visit to India, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi broke the protocol and gave a warm welcome. In the ‘World Exclusive’ interview given to ‘Aaj Tak’ before his visit to India, Putin talked to Aaj Tak’s Managing Editor Anjana Om Kashyap and India Today’s Foreign Affairs Editor Geeta Mohan on many issues. He expressed his views on questions related to immortality, health care and Gen Z protests around the world. He said that everything has an end, only God is going to last forever.
During the interview, when India Today’s Foreign Affairs Editor Geeta Mohan asked Putin that he just talked about health. There was a hot mic moment between you and President Xi Jinping. When you talked about longevity, advances in medicine and biohacking, there was a lot of discussion about it. Do you think immortality can really be achieved?
Technical Perspectives on Longevity
Responding to this, Putin said that I believe that life can be prolonged through science, indeed we can prolong life and this is true. However, everything has an end. Only God is going to last forever.
Giving an example, he said, ’77 years ago the average age of a person in India was 31 years and now it is around 70 years.’
Due to improvement in health care, child deaths in India have reduced four times, this is the result of health care and I congratulate India for this.
Regarding the future, Putin said that if AI and genetic engineering are used in health care, its impact will be tremendous, but in the end he reiterated that all things have an end.
Meanwhile, Anjana Om Kashyap asked Putin that without pointing out your age, recently there have been a lot of protests by Gen Z across the world. How do you connect with the younger generation? Today there are many leaders who look younger than their age. How does this happen and how do you connect with youth in Russia?
Putin’s opinion on Gen Z protests
On this the Russian President said, all this is not new here. You know that there has always been talk of contradictions in literature and art. Between old and new generations, between fathers and sons. These things and these images have always been present in our old writings also. Everyone needs to know that there is nothing new here.
He said, ‘You know what’s new? Technology is new. Messenger, Telegram etc., which are still being actively used to influence the younger generation. This generation is more or less the same young people who use mobile more and are more fanatic. The young generation thinks that only they are facing injustice and no one has seen all this before them. The youth see all this and tell everyone around them.
Youth who use mobile are more fanatic
Putin said, ‘They think it is very easy to deal with this. It can be solved easily, but when a person becomes more intelligent and tries to change something himself, then he comes to know that the solution for which he thought was easy, is not as easy as it seems at first glance.
It is necessary to use the tools of youth
The Russian President advised leaders that we need to work with people and not say ‘you are just young, you don’t understand anything’. He said that you need to always be in touch with the youth and use their tools, ways of delivering information to them, feedback on social networks etc. Putin said that there is a need to work there and I am sure India is doing it to some extent. I want to wish you every success.
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