In winning Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh elections recently, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has once again proved a master strategist. Before the elections, there was a lot of hollow speculation. After the elections, there are many post-mortems. Ad hoc theories are being offered to fit specific results. But there is no denying one straightforward fact: PM Modi is an unprecedented phenomenon in the annals of popular politics. He has weathered every criticism. He has taken every risk and put himself on the line. He has defied every prediction, and written his own script of popular acclamation. No conventional wisdom of politics applies to him.
PM Modi still manages to make other parties look like tired, corrupt, negative emblems of the past; people continue to repose faith in him as the energetic, clean, dynamic, hopeful repository of the future. No matter where you stand on the political and social spectrum, it will be churlish not to acknowledge this straightforward political fact.
Though, the seat tally in Gujarat was much below the expectation of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the latest election results have amply proved that the party under the charismatic leadership of Modi, has firmly established itself as the most distinguished political party of modern India. Indeed, the election results consolidates the BJP’s dominance. This is made more robust by its social dominance – its social base now has an unprecedented depth and breadth. It has negated ossified logics of caste arithmetic to win over substantial numbers of OBC and Dalits in addition to upper castes. The unacknowledged social story in the BJP’s rise is its transformation of rules of caste politics and aligning them to a larger narrative. Almost no other party is able to tap into this transformative urge.
As far as electoral politics goes, people are willing to vote big mandates, if they seem convinced of your sincerity and capability – the BJP is gaining victory after victory in elections because of the exceptional faith Indian voters appear to have in PM Modi, and their displeasure to the abject failure of imagination on the part of his combined opposition. Every time a new electoral defeat happens, venerable opposition leaders and their stooges say exactly the same thing they have been saying since the Modi era began. They announce that they have to ‘come together’ by 2019 to defeat the ‘forces of communalism, fascism and Hindutva’. Can they think of nothing newer than this dated war cry?
In its little over three-and-a-half year in office, the Modi government has, among other things, made certain considerable efforts in bringing about qualitative improvement in the governance through economic and social reforms. Notably, the government has scrapped more than a thousand laws, some dating to the colonial Raj; but the several laws that have been amended and the fresh ones that have been passed from GST and the Real Estate Regulation Act, to Benami Transactions Prohibition Act and Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets Act, to new laws for recovery of debt, insolvency and bankruptcy, reflect the government’s intent to quicken the pace of economic change and extend its political constituency to the underprivileged apart from the country’s middle class. Indeed, these are not laws that merely tinker with the status quo; their impact is expected to be game-changing.
Initially, law-making proved more difficult than may have been anticipated after Modi led the NDA to 336 seats in the Lok Sabha. An unlikely, opposition coalition of the Congress, Trinamool, Left, SP and BSP used BJP’s lack of majority in the Upper House to ensure bill passed by Lok Sabha were referred to select committees – important reform legislations marked time. It took months of hard bargaining and resorting to parliamentary stratagem of terming certain legislations – example, Aadhaar – as money bills, before law-making began to gather pace. In fact, laws that are expected to significantly alter how business is conducted and politics is practiced were passed as BJP consolidated its dominance in state elections during the last two years (2016 and 2017) after initial setbacks in Delhi and Bihar in 2015.
With an eye to the political imperative of social equity, the government moved on economic legislation linked to its stated objectives to speed up business. The sweep of legislations has been ambitious, looking to alter both social and economic behaviour. Besides, the high-profile new laws mentioned earlier, there have been several others – such as the ones for setting up dedicated commercial benches in court and making the auction of coal and minerals mandatory. The rights of persons with disability is now law as is the legislation to grant maternity benefits to women. Expansion of the definition of disabilities and the increase in paid maternity leave to 26 weeks from 12 weeks are interventions that will likely compel even the private sector to extend similar benefits to their workforce.
Earlier, the government altered the Juvenile Justice Act to provide for teens in the 16 to 18 age group to be treated as adults in heinous offences. The government also brought in the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Act to provide tougher punishment. If changes in juvenile law point to tougher line on crime, amendment to the SC and ST Act incorporate specific humiliations such as forced tonsuring and denial to water resources. Another legislation to grant constitutional status to the national commission for backward classes, however, is pending approval.
Now, Modi is in a position to contemplate even far-reaching constitutional reforms like simultaneous elections.
Indeed, BJP’s dominance is rising steadily. This is without any dynasty or family control – only by sheer hard work, good governance, profound organizational presence and a selfless leadership of a man of destiny, Narendra Modi, who has a vision to make India truly a great country.
(The writer is a freelance journalist).
