Panaji: Ireland Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, who has his roots in India, is in Sunny Goa to bring in the New Year. Lest Auld Acquaintance be forgot… Leo is rounding off a visit to India with a 31st December night in coastal Goa.
Varadkar, who is currently on a private visit to India, would arrive in Goa on Monday afternoon, a senior police official said.
“Prime Minister Varadkar’s visit is entirely private.
There are no official functions planned during his visit. He would be in Goa till January 1 alongwith his family,” he said.
He will take a flight from the Dabolim Airport here on January 1 afternoon to return to his country, the official added.
Leo Varadkar was elected Irish Prime Minister in 2017, making the 38-year-old son of an Indian immigrant the once-staunchly Catholic country’s first gay premier and the youngest person to hold the office.
On Sunday, Varadkar along with his family members visited his ancestral village Varad in the coastal Sindhudurg district of Maharashtra.
Mr Varadkar, a qualified doctor, only revealed he was gay months before Ireland became the first country in the world to back same-sex marriage in a referendum in May 2015.
It was his first visit to the village, said Varadkar, who became prime minister of Ireland in June 2017.
His father Ashok Varadkar, a doctor, moved to the United Kingdom in the 1960s.
The visit was a “special moment” as three generations of his family gathered at Varad, the Ireland prime minister said after the villagers felicitated him.
He also visited a temple of the village deity.