Preparing for Prime Minister Narendra Modi

[PKBasu]

Those here who are virulently opposed to Modi are unlikely to bother about clicking on a html link, so I am cutting and pasting MJ Akbar's entire article below. Anybody who knows him knows that he has been vehemently opposed to the RSS and Sangh Parivar all his life. But I have watched his gradual conversion to the Modi cause -- not least because he was one of the Muslim intellectuals Narendra Modi reached out to several years ago when he wanted to boost his literacy program for Gujarat's children, and especially its Muslim children, and wanted Muslim intellectuals to help his out-reach program. I was surprised to hear about this from MJ about 4 years ago, and have been even more surprised that he never wrote about it publicly. For him to support Narendra Modi is a HUGE step, and MJ's own lifetime of writings will be trotted out to show him up. But I think he makes a compelling case -- although I must say I was surprised that he joined the BJP formally. (Until 4 months ago, I would not have thought it possible; but I did get a strong feeling from my last long conversation with him that he was headed this way).

Why I joined the BJP

By M.J. Akbar

Anyone who speaks in public, whether master orator or ordinary word-shuffler, comes to a platform after some preparation. The one eventuality no one can quite prepare for is a crisis; and there is no crisis greater for an individual than a threat to one’s life. At that moment, the reaction is more likely to emerge from the heart than the head.

The bombs that began to burst at Narendra Modi’s Patliputra rally were aimed at the crowds, of course, but also at him. His instant response was to ask a powerful question of both Hindus and Muslims that went to the crux of the principal challenge before our nation, and included its solution as well. He asked these two great communities of our country to choose: They could either fight each other, or together they could confront that shaming curse called poverty.

This placed everything in context and priority: We need peace in our country as an absolute fundamental necessity. This gives us the chance to rescue an economy that has been sent to the hospital in the last decade before it sinks to a deathbed. The primary purpose of economic growth is to lift the poorest from their awful misery; and this can best be achieved only when every Indian, across differences of creed and caste, works hand in hand. We either move together or we barely move at all. It was an incisive definition of inclusive growth. At a time when Modi could have been forgiven for being emotional, he was practical, clearly focused and determined to pursue an economic vision.

This fit a pattern. In a speech on August 15 last year, he said that the religion of anyone in public service was the constitution of India. A compilation of his views by Siddharth Mazumdar, released a few weeks ago, opens with this sentence: “The essence of secularism is that all religions are equal before the law.” It asserted that sarva dharma sambhav was the philosophical magnet that united India from an ancient age.

But how do such principles accord with the fact of the Gujarat riots, which is a constant theme in all attacks on him? I raised questions at the time of the riots as much as any other journalist did. Paradoxically, these questions were answered over ten years by the UPA government.

There has never been, since independence, such intense scrutiny, or such absolute determination to trace guilt to a chief minister, as Modi faced from institutions loyal to the UPA government over two full terms. Every relevant instrument of state was assigned the task of finding something, anything, that could trace guilt to Modi. They could not. The Supreme Court, which is above politics and parties, and which is our invaluable, independent guardian of the law and constitution, undertook its own enquiries. Its first findings are in, and we know that the answer is exoneration. Moreover, there has been judicial accountability to an unprecedented degree in Gujarat. We are still waiting for justice in a hundred previous riots.

One suspects that only some politicians have a vested interest in the past during an election when Indians want to vote for their future. The young want a government that gives them jobs; parents want their entrepreneurial skills to turn into food on the plate, into schools for their children, and into a horizon of hope. When Modi talks of building a hundred new cities, they can see jobs and opportunity rise with every floor of a new township.

One significant indicator of the public anger lies in a statistic: Employment has grown, on an average, at only 2% in the past decade. If the rate was higher in the first five years of UPA, when the economy was faring better, then one assumes it must have sunk to less than 2% in the second UPA term. A nation that was soaring on achievement and hope has sunk into depression.

We need a national recovery mission. Only someone who has delivered can offer a credible promise of leading such a critical mission. For those on the wrong side of 30 or 40, five years is just another passage in life. For those who are 20, five years is the difference between aspiration and despair. If a young person does not find a job in these five years, he or she begins to lose that vital energy which comes from self-confidence. If the young do not power the economy then the economy will be stuck in the quagmire of idle waste.

There is only one way forward. And there is, among the visible choices, only one person best suited to lift the nation out of a septic swamp. You know his name as well as I do.


(Published in the Times of India, and in the Dhaka Tribune, among other newspapers).

[krinix]

Wow another Golden Dialogue from Mr Modi, His PR team must be writing dialogues parallel to the B class Movie industry of Mumbai!

3 "AKs" helping Pakistan. "The third is AK 49 - he has just spawned a party and on his party's official website he has given away Jammu and Kashmir to Pakistan.

Is PM in the running allowed to speak this way?

[Atithee]

It is a free country, anyone can speak in anyway. The question we should be asking is are we allowed to vote this way? That is, who is ultimately responsible -- the this way speaker or the this way approving voter.

[sanjay8886]

I believe whether it is Rahul or Modi(Cong vs BJP), nothing is going to change. The name of the scams would change, and that's it. I do not give discredit to Modi for Godhra's riot but at the same time there is not much evidence for Gujarat's development due to Modi. However, there are plenty of evidence to suggest Modi is equally corrupt, re-inducting Yedurappa and Reddy brothers.

I like the option of Kejriwal. I know he does not have money or organization which is needed to get votes. But he has the right intention, he wants to clean the system to the extent that govt and police officials work as they were suppose to work. You cannot give him discredit for leaving Delhi in 49 days, for that he needed majority. If there is any hope, it is with Kejriwal. I know, he cannot win or has any chance to form govt. However, he can still win 10-15 seats to have a say in parliament and show the nation the nexus between Ambanis and BJP/Cong.

Rest of the other parties, less said would be better.

[prasen9]

Amongst the alternatives that there are available now, I haven't heard a single argument why X would be a viable and better choice.

Because any X who has not been a party to an abysmal government response that results in the deaths of people would provide better security to all Indians than Modi can --- if we believe that the future can be predicted by what happened in the past. If the future does not depend on the past, then Modi and everyone else is at the same spot wrt the economic argument too. In that case, just toss a coin and select whom you want to vote for.

[jayakris]

What would prevent him from repeating such inaction, when another such incident happens? the "high" office of being the PM of India? - say nothing about the high office of being a CM... And this time, for the heck of it, let us say it happens somewhere in northern Kerala!

On the first part, see above.

For the second part about kerala... ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? The only people in the land of Adi Sankara who are afraid of any massacre of them are the majority Hindus with their deep divisions within - that have rendered them without a voice in anything; politics or business or media. Or, were you talking of a massacre of Hindus by any chance? If you were, I hope the Kerala CM who usually has no need to care a damn for the Hindus, would hopefully care at least in preventing a massacre of them.

By that, I meant a Godhra style incident where hindu pilgrims are dead in Kerala. What happens after that? Does Modi being a PM enables and emboldens the revenge mentality of the mob? Will he step-in to prevent the riots in Kerala and punish culprits or step aside and watch as muslims are killed?

Sorry if this sounds heartless, but I think those Keralite muslim's deaths shouldn't be causing the rest of Indians even further hurt - let us have Modi focus on the economy of India. What can a PM do, sitting so far away in Delhi?! La la Lala La...

If any muslims try to set fire to a rail coach full of Hindus in Kerala, about half of the hindus will first jump out to help the muslims set fire to the other half. If these were all BJP or RSS Hindus in the coach, about 4 times as many Hindus, many of them communists and congress supporters will all join hands and try to join the Muslims to set fire to the coach from outside in no time (and they probably would have told the muslims beforehand exactly how they would support the setting of fire to teach these BJP guys a lesson ). In any case, these 80% of Hindus will be spending the next 3 months standing guard at every madrasa and justifying that the 20% hindus who are BPJ/RSS types had incited the muslims and that the muslims only deserve protection from these mulsim-killing Modi followers.

By the way, if you haven't read about this - read this wiki page on Malabar/Moplah rebellion where 10s of thousands of hindus were annihilated by muslims and hindus did not or could not respond/react just 90 years back. The situation is hardly different even now.

The point is, not every place in India is Gujarat. Not every place is Ayodhya or UP either. I am sick of all such places being held hostage by whatever crap fanatic idiots did in places like Gujarat. Not decades later. Not even when our discussion topic is a CM who was no good in preventing the pogrom in Gujarat (but no CM or PM really has been able to stop any such violence in India). The said CM governed well since then, and he is STILL not found culpable by Indian courts after a decade of Congress' trying their level best with every machinery that is at their disposal. There are vast majority of people in India, both hindus and muslims, who would rather move on from the Gujrat riots that is not THEIR riots (nor are they in any situation to cause or be part of such riots or are inclined the least bit towards it), who want to only find a way to better their lives with the help of somebody who can govern from Delhi. It is hard to make a case for a PM-possibility who is better at governance than Modi right now. Taking the whole of India to be a hindu mob ready to kill muslims is just a myth and exaggeration that needs to end. To think that Modi will be sitting in Delhi and enabling it, is simply malarkey. Nothing less. If he is the best we see for governing the country now by focusing on economic improvements, and if he has no record of partiality to any community in framing economic policies, he is my man.

[sameerph]

Actually, Telangana will only come into existence formally in June. So, in this election it is still Andhra Pradesh. Of the 17 Telangana seats, I suspect that Hyderabad city will still lean towards either TDP or YSRC rather than TSR. Kiran Kumar Reddy has also launched a party of his own, so the fight in Seema-Andhra could be 4- or 5-cornered -- ideal for the BJP, especially if it can work out seat adjustments with TDP in Seemandhra and TRS in Telangana.

Then, why would BJP want to go with TRS... They could just go with TDP all the way in Telangana & Seemandhra...
I don't think there is anything left for TDP in the Telangana region, at least for this election... It's going to be TRS all the way, not that I like it...

It looks like what you are saying may be true as it looks like BJP state unit is not agreeing to unreasonable demand by TDP in Telangana & may got it alone .

BJP says no deal with TDP, will contest alone in Telangana

[prasen9]

It is hard to make a case for a PM-possibility who is better at governance than Modi right now. ... If he is the best we see for governing the country now by focusing on economic improvements, and if he has no record of partiality to any community in framing economic policies, he is my man.

There is no evidence to say that he is the best except at marketing. The HDI of Gujarat is worse than average. His record in maintaining law and order has been bad even though we cannot prove that he is a criminal. There is no reason to choose him.

[prasen9]

The point is, not every place in India is Gujarat.

By this logic, his above-average economic numbers are not translatable to the whole of India too. You cannot choose his failures and discount them by saying that India is not Gujarat and then count his successes and say that therefore we should vote for him. Gujaratis have always been more industrious than the rest of India taken together.

[kujo]

Amongst the alternatives that there are available now, I haven't heard a single argument why X would be a viable and better choice.

Because any X who has not been a party to an abysmal government response that results in the deaths of people would provide better security to all Indians than Modi can --- if we believe that the future can be predicted by what happened in the past. If the future does not depend on the past, then Modi and everyone else is at the same spot wrt the economic argument too. In that case, just toss a coin and select whom you want to vote for.

Yes to that logic from prasen. Don't want to argue or belabor these points, and decided to do a coin toss.

Well, what do you know, it came up as Modi?! damn it.
Tried it again, thinking best of 3 and it turned out to be Modi again... and so on, for 6 consecutive times!!

ps: note to self - never gamble!

[prasen9]

Ok. Point taken.

[Prem]

It is hard to make a case for a PM-possibility who is better at governance than Modi right now. ... If he is the best we see for governing the country now by focusing on economic improvements, and if he has no record of partiality to any community in framing economic policies, he is my man.

There is no evidence to say that he is the best except at marketing. The HDI of Gujarat is worse than average. His record in maintaining law and order has been bad even though we cannot prove that he is a criminal. There is no reason to choose him.

Agree that Modi and his team is very good at Marketing.
Modi has cleverly used the media and he is made to look far better than every other CM.
News on Gujarat development, rupee will touch 40 against dollar, respond strongly to Pakistan/China are all media hype!!!
Could someone name his core team?
He has only worked at state level and with people like Amit Shah (currently on bail) etc.
it's the media hype which is helping him but in reality he does not have a great team other than going with the old timers like Rajnath, Jaitley, Yeddyurappa etc. Will we really see any change with these people in charge?
Agree we don't have alternative and hence people will vote for NaMo but hope he lives to their expectation.

[Tolamu]

I'm not anti-BJP. But in my humble opinion the title of this thread should be changed to Preparing for a new prime minister. Why should it be Modi-specific? Are we all sure of him to be the next PM? I beg to differ.

[Atithee]

I second Tolamu's request.

[jayakris]

It is hard to make a case for a PM-possibility who is better at governance than Modi right now. ... If he is the best we see for governing the country now by focusing on economic improvements, and if he has no record of partiality to any community in framing economic policies, he is my man.

There is no evidence to say that he is the best except at marketing. The HDI of Gujarat is worse than average. His record in maintaining law and order has been bad even though we cannot prove that he is a criminal. There is no reason to choose him.

prasen, I know you know that I know you to be able to parse my line better than that ... I did not say that he is THE best or anything, if you take the sentence along with the sentence that came ahead of it. "Hard to make a better case for another PM-possibility", I said. That's all. Untested Rahul Gandhi who seems to mean well but has so often looked too naive, and the crazy guy of the party that came to the scene with a pointless populist theme ("no corruption", like THAT is what is stopping India's economic development!) -- those are the only other clearly projected possibilities, right? I will pick Modi over them. That is all I am saying.

If any of you are arguing for another name, we can discuss it - but if you don't, then I stick with what I said that "it is hard to make case for another PM-possibility" (at least it is hard for me - you are welcome to make one) ... Thus I said, "if Modi is the best we see,...". Don't keep attacking Modi, if you won't put forth somebody else you want who has even a small chance to become the PM.

As for picking and choosing good and bad for convenience, that you accuse me of - I did none of that. Yes, Gujarat is not India, as you say. But I was commenting on what the population would do in Gujarat and won't do in other places in India - and this is demonstrated in history very well, and so my statement that India and vast majority of Indian areas will not go into religious riots and that the PM cannot engineer it nor prevent it, stands. It is a little easier to say that the administrative style (of being the "man in charge") of ONE person is more transferable from a CM job to a PM job. You can say that it is all marketing, but what is this great marketing device that Modi and BJP has had? Are you claiming that Indian media/press is pro-BJP (you must be kidding, then) running this campaign that he is a guy who is "in charge and getting things done" in Gujarat? So, I do not believe that Modi's style of governing is a myth made out of some clever marketing. I think that is real, and I do believe that the style is transferable. Its success in economic development is a question mark at the national level, but once again, in the absence of counter-arguments that a CM who have shown a "person in charge" style in state governance being unsuccessful at that as a PM, I have to go with some level of transferability of evidence in the case of one person. [I hope you see the difference in transferability of population-behavior and individual-behavior. i.e., I wouldn't make the argument for say BJP being successful in say two or three states as evidence that transfers to some BJP government being successful at the center].

Now, if you repeat your question on why I am not transferring Modi's inability in controlling state riots to similar inability as a PM, I already said multiple times that it is not that relevant a criterion for the PM's job (because I strongly believe that the PM does not have the machinery to respond quickly to riots in India, and that the evidence is there that no PM has done a thing in the cases where we have had riots since independence). The kind of things that a state CM does in bringing in encouraging businesses, can transfer to the center, as it is a matter of how "in charge" a person is, in matters that he can control (decisions on the economy is one example).

For once I would like to see a PM who has governed a state with some level of economic success (whether helped by the industrious nature of the state's people or not). I want to see how transferable the transferable aspects of a "man in charge" administrative style of a CM is, to the PM job. After 67 years of independence, we still have no data on this, right? Nothing much else has worked all that great so far. I want to see what happens, and I don't want irrelevant items cloud it. Yes, IMHO, riot control is irrelevant when our constitution does not grant our PM the ability to act immediately on such local events. That may sound tough or callous or whatever for some of you - but I want to speak my mind. Gujarat riots are irrelevant in this discussion.