Describing India as a “pluralistic place” that has “done reasonably well,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who visited Gujarat on Monday, said a lot of societies are turning “inwards towards nationalism or protectionism” as a way of holding on to the past.

Terming the heterogeneous communities and societies as the “new reality of 21st century”, the Canadian PM while interacting with the student community at the Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A) said, “The biggest challenge that we are going to have as species – is doing something that India has always done fairly well and Canada does fairly well as well – which is understanding that differences have to become a source of strength and not source of weakness.”

Trudeau talked at length about the pluralistic societies that exist in Canada and how they have given shelter to about 4,0000 Syrian refugees. “This approach (pluralism) is something that a lot of societies are struggling with and they, in many places, turn inwards towards nationalism or protectionism as a way of holding on to a way, that we used to be, a …. India as a pluralistic place has always done reasonably well. It can always do better, just like we can do better,” he remarked.