India: Why The Shivers?

Turn the clock back to the Summer of 2014. Things were pretty much the same-a general election had ended. North India was expected to face another drought. Maoists were on the loose in the Red States of Central India, Pakistan was breathing down our neck on the Western Borders and China on the North and East. To make the plot more exciting, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh were baring their fangs and puny bankrupt Nepal was threatening to go RED. The Indian Economy was in doldrums, inflation was high and currency was expected to sink. But there was Hope. That Hope was of such a magnitude that journos came out with books, “the elections that changed India”and fund managers came shouting from roof-tops that Ïndia had decisively turned to the Right”

One year later everything is the same-including all the conceived and perceived problems. But Hope is no longer a “premium”category. Public memory is short. 30 years ago in the aftermath of Mrs Gandhi’s assassination, her son Rajiv came to power in the Winters of 1984 with a Lok Sabha tally of 415 seats. BJP got 2 out of 543. In 2014 BJP leader Modi came with a tally of 282. This was a simple lower house majority and nothing earth shaking. Except that the traumatic 30 years since 1984 saw numerous coalitions come to power. And the public came to assume that the Nation was now condemned to a future of successive rag-tag coalitions bereft of ideology or thought.

To Rajiv Gandhi’s credit in his first 2 years in office he did a lot. He was the first to bring in Japanese investment into Automobile space with Suzuki, Mitsubishi, Yamaha, Honda and Mazda coming into the country. He also made the first effort at Panchayati Raj-trying to push power to the lowest strata of society. “Make people responsible for their destiny”. Things were good till 1986, when a crazed VP Singh turned upon the PM with Bofors Gun and single-handedly destroyed what was becoming a two party democracy. 

We have forgotten the good pf one man, and are championing the cause of another PM. He may, unlike Rajiv Gandhi, succeed or turn out to be as big a failure. What happens will depend upon a couple of things-can we fix the bureaucracy and will individuals as a part of society accept responsibility? The bureaucrats destroyed Rajiv Gandhi-sending him on endless foreign tours-giving him the name of a Foreign PM. Modi is getting the same treatment. He did 18 nations in the past twelve months and will do another 21 in the next twelve.

Which begets the question? Do we have problems at home or overseas? Are solutions to be found in India or overseas? Should the aggrandisement of Modi end up in 5 years of overseas tours, people may assume with certainty that the next Government will be the worst fractured polity in 70 years. Add to the existing mess and 2.5 crore babies born every year, these two factors alone will mean the literal destruction of Modi. We will have a situation of a GOI without power and an irresponsible individual citizen that continues to breed in contempt of dwindling economics. The Red Tape, GOI and public will be jointly responsible for failure and the nation will be in a pre-split chaos of the former Soviet Union.