As someone who's well-versed with the "face-saving" aspects of Indian culture, I can state with clarity that the statement they put out is completely in character.

Folks in India — especially the boomer class — are trepidated by how they're perceived over actual substance and quality of their work (exceptions exist, of course).

Edit: Sudhir Kakar's (an Indian psychoanalyst) work on Indian identity (The Inner World, Intimate Relations) helped me decode my own origin culture's internal logic. Highly recommend it for people of South Asian diaspora.