The ink rebellion

"HIS (Vinod Mehta) voice is missed in the present climate, when dissent is being stifled, when the minorities feel increasingly insecure, when the secular fabric of our society is threatened, when bigotry and obscurantism seem to flourish unchecked," Congress president Sonia Gandhi had spoken in one of her trademark passionate and combative short speech on the occasion of presentation of GK Reddy award to the former Outlook Editor. 

Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul Gandhi have not written even one of their speech yet. Her lamentation on "intolerance", "bigotry", "obscurantism" was delivered on May 9 this year. The speech writer was understandably Jairam Ramesh. 

No rationalist writers were killed by May 9 either in Karnataka and Maharashtra. None was yet lynched to death on rumour of having eaten beef. Yet, Sonia Gandhi bemoaned lack of a writer in Mehta who was "passionate upholder of our democratic and secular ideals, who harboured sympathy for the disempowered and held no fear of the rich and powerful". 

Mehta was a journalist and not a politician as stated in the description. Sonia Gandhi was sending her message loud and clear to the target. In less than five months, her message was decoded and acted upon. Forty Sahitya Akademy awardees have so far surrendered their awards; some with prize money also. Fugitive author Salman Rushdie also lent his support to the rebels in writers, and educated Indians about his rich vocabulary by terming his critics as "Modi toadies". 

Nayantara Sehgal, whose identity is from her lineage with Nehru, was among the first to surrender the Sahitya Akademy award. Later, she claimed smart cities would be of no use if "stupid" people lived in them. Ghulam Nabi Khayal from Jammu and Kashmir was more clear on his reasons and he stated that "ever since the BJP came to power...". 

Writers from Karnataka to Kashmir, from Gujrat to Assam have joined the rat race to return their Sahitya Akademy awards. The number will only swell. They all rant and bemoan the silence of Narendra Modi. And they have seemingly proved that they are rattled with the rise of Modi. 

The writers making news have circumstantial records against them on their pains for communal harmony. On close scrutiny, they may even be found to have been the beneficiaries of the Nehruvian "left-turn" in literature and history writing. None of them ever took pains to write on disappearance of Subhash Chandra Bose. It took the doggedness of the journalist turned researcher Anuj Dhar to demolish the myth perpetuated by the Congress in the country. Even when the Sikhs were butchered in 1984 and democracy was murdered during Emergency, these anguished writers chose to keep their inks dried. No Muslim writer has yet penned the pathos of the Kashmiri pundits. 

That the worst communal frenzy and in fact of much larger proportion than the post-Godhra riots took place in Muzaffarnagar and its adjoining areas in western Uttar pradesh under the watch of the "secular" chief minister of the state Akhilesh Yadav missed the radar of these writers with great ease is a tale not yet told. They did not pay heed to the blatant communal politicking of Mulayam Singh Yadav and AzamKhan in Uttar Pradesh till the 2014 Lok Sabha elections as well. They did not even know that the people of western UP turned rabidly communal in a span of a few years. Their communal frenzy devoured the Muslim man in Dadri most recently. 

Writers are the conscience keepers of the society. But they opted to barter the might of their pen to become carriers of the agenda of political parties for gains. They lobby for awards. They sing songs of glory of those who are in power. That India has not seen a Munshi Premchand or Ramdhari Singh Dinkar for ages tell the larger tales that these media attention hungry writers have contributed the least in evolving a multi-cultural and tolerant society in India. 

The rebellion of "pen" against Modi is nothing but a snobbish, hypocritical, and paranoid response of a tribe which fear arrival of an assertive "right" on social and political mainstream.

                                                            *****

Read More in my Book -- The enabler Narendra Modi: Breaking stereotypes. Buy at myBook.to/Indianpolitics at Amazon

Available in Kindle & Paperback editions at Amazon

Postscript:

In an interview to Nirendra Dev, a senior journalist, late Khuswant Singh (extract in pix) argued shutting down of Sahitya Akademy. He was piqued to see 100s being given awards each year. Recipients did not need to have literary merits, but should have known ways to grease the palms of influential. Khuswant Singh once had his heart in his mouth when he saw 10 Sindhi writers lining up to receive the Sahitya Akademy award. How could so many people get award in one year for a language, which is so tough, he reminisced. As mentioned in the extract (in the pix), Khuswant Singh strongly believed that there was no rationale for Sahitya Akademy to exist and it only promoted crony writers who knew whose palms to grease.

Khuswant Singh's views apart, the question which must agitate a rationale mind is that how come a government is in the business of giving awards notwithstanding the fact that such bodies are autonomous (only for the namesake).

BEYOND NEWS

The manner in which scores of writers and those engaged with theater have returned their awards suggest a pattern without any doubt.

And on cue a "discussion" was held at Indian National Press Club. The capacity audience listened to panel with full attention, with a few foreigner media professional dropping in to feel the pulse of the people. They had a few books at display, which included the likes of "Ath Modi Katha", "Hamara Sabse Bada Dushman -- with cover having two photos, one of Adolf Hitler and another of the RSS activists in a march", "Moditva--Hinduvadi sarkar ka Sanghi Abhiyan", etc. All the books on the display had one thing in common, that they are authored by those whose hatred for the RSS and Narendra Modi, besides the BJP run in their blood.

The Congress leader and former MP Sandeep Dikshit too had dropped in for this discussion, but he chose to slip away when it dawned upon him, that the political facade behind which the writers are seeking to hide may fall off.      

The mirror-3

MIcro-thoughts:

Your memories have faded, but for those smiles.

A cynical society ills its people.

Night belongs to dark forces.

How you write gives a good measure of you.

Brain cells must only pull strings of muscles.

Prosperity induces hypocrisy.

Past is history and there're no other ways to look at it.

Restraint will soon be one word Bible for sanity.

Political class most importantly among all made society more selfish.

When was last time public representative really represented people in Parliament.

Staying normal is increasingly becoming a challenge.

Inspirational value of quotes of great men go down with passage of time.

We've talked enough of great men, spare some time for lesser mortals.

Nation building is now an abstract idea.

Parliament logjam in times of whipcracy

Disclaimer: This piece is intended merely for discussion, and not at all casts aspersions on temple of largest democracy of the world. 

INDIAN Parliament has seen many political weathers to wilt to current gust of doggedness. 

Demography of India is transforming each day. India is getting younger. The young India is both a boon and bane in measures not easy to quantify. The boon obviously is in demographic dividend for economy. None talk about the other side of the story for want of an audience.

The most telling disability of young India is that its sense of history is much narrow. The time span of historical awareness is squeezing with each passing day. And to expect this growing class to pay attention to context and thereby historical background would be to expect too much. 

That the Congress and its tiny lot of camp followers have enforced a lock-down on Rajya Sabha, because the BJP when in Opposition had done the same stand having become irrelevant by the passage of time. And, hence, Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan has growing lot of admirers among the youth. 

Incidentally, political class invariably is blessed with short memory and any inconvenient pass events get erased with ease. Congress president Sonia Gandhi believes PM Narendra Modi is replicating Gujrat model in Parliament. She claimed Modi used to get Congress MLAs suspended from Gujrat Assembly without fail during each session. 

But Gandhi would surely not mention that the UPA government just two years ago had got passed State Reorganisation Bill to create the state of Telangana in not so glorious manner. Scores of MPs hailing from united Andhra Pradesh were suspended for days, for having camped in the well of the House and having held placards aloft against division of the state. The matter had come to such an extent that a Congress MP had pressed canister to spray pepper right in the well of the Lok Sabha and had to be overpowered after enough fisticuffs. That he endangered the health of many MPs, journalists and common men and women in the public gallery predictably did not invite attention of the presiding officers of the Parliament. 

Gandhi could equally consult her colleague Sheila Dikshit and enlighten herself how she had perfected the art of "naming and suspending" Opposition MLAs in Delhi Assembly during her over 15 years of rule. 

DOGGEDNESS of both Congress and BJP is worrisome. The Congress is surely looking to find the path to revive the party from the newly found lung power in logjam of Parliament. The BJP is on an extended hangover of having been served strongly intoxicating electoral victory a year ago much beyond their expectation. The BJP arguably believes the time has come to roll over the Congress. If the Congress is served a telling fatal blow, the BJP will always be the first natural choice of people for power in New Delhi.    

If not for politically motivated doggedness of the Congress, the Opposition could have explored the option for a censure motion in both the Houses of the Parliament against External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj. The Opposition is in majority in Rajya Sabha and could have the desired results if its unity is real. 

BEYOND the explicitly seen reasons for lock-down in Rajya Sabha (Lok Sabha is functioning), there are larger issues. Firstly, the issue of democracy in the real sense. The weapon of whip given to political parties by late Rajiv Gandhi through the anti-defection law has made democracy hypocritical. The MPs are largely herds swayed by the direction of the whip.

Secondly, the issue whether the members of Parliament are lawmakers in the real sense is discussed in hushed voices in the corridors of the temple of democracy. How many laws have been enacted through the initiatives of the MPs and their discussions in both the Houses of Parliament? Aren't the MPs mere rubber stamps to the legislative bills drafted by the babus?   

Thirdly, do both the Houses of Parliament really make the government accountable. An illustration may answer this question. In the ongoing Monsoon session, Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan indicated in Lok Sabha during Question Hour, that the government would not prefer to transfer cash into accounts of beneficiaries of the food subsidy. "The government spends Rs 1.31 lakh crore under food subsidy each year. Though we've launched DBT (Direct benefit transfer) in Pudduchery, Chandigarh and Dadar and Nagar Haveli, there're issues like (a) will people really buy foodgrains and if yes then of what quality; (b) what will happen to so many PDS shops and dealers; (c) what will happen to godowns built so far; (d) what if even 10 per cent of beneficiaries miss out from DBT for any reasons," said Paswan. 

No MPs present contested Paswan's concerns. All issues raised by Paswan are equally applicable for DBT for LPG subsidy. Tax payers' money can surely not be used to justify the need of PDS shops, dealers and godowns. And, lastly, the quality of grains given by PDS shops makes Paswan's another worry laughable. 

Excerpt from my book -- The enabler Narendra Modi.

And, most importantly, the quality of debate in both the Houses of Parliament tell a much larger story. A comparison between the 15th and 16th Lok Sabha in the context of quality of debates could make for an exciting research. That Nishikant Dubey from the BJP and Veerappa Moily from the Congress are lead speakers on economy in the current Lok Sabha tell the story much evidently. 

                                                             *****

The book -- The enabler Narendra Modi -- is available at myBook.to/Indianpolitics in paperback & Kindle. Kindle app can be downloaded from Google Play (for android phone) http://bit.ly/19c6Xpm for PC http://amzn.to/1ImLwl0 for Apple phone/ IPad http://apple.co/1MrRaF5

The mirror-2

Micro-thoughts:

MIRRORS don't show much of us anymore.

HYPOCRISY seeks to sneak in with prosperity.

THAT too many crooks are around among educated lots tells sorry tales of Indian education system & society at large.

NO harm in aspiring to shine like sun, but what about coolness of the moon.

TO think you can write great without reading enough is just floating in fantasy air.

TREES with deep roots live longer and stay healthy.

DON'T be in awe of awards; most of them are favours.

BRAIN automatically trashes futuristic commitments.

ALL men can't be Lord Buddha. They can't either be ants.

AFTER long walk, I looked back. Only my shadow had stayed.

BARKING a wrong tree is known to be painful, yet it's common.

YOU shut yourself inside & outside thugs run amok.

LOVE and familiarity aren't greatest of friends.

MEN come from nature and go back to it in end, yet live away.

Haunting past

THE maxim that you reap what you sow must be ringing in the ears of floor managers of ruling NDA. 

That the BJP in Opposition led by Sushma Swaraj had choked Parliamentary space of UPA-II would not yet have faded from the memories of Congress leaders. And the fact that the BJP had been so nasty to call the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh a thief must surely have run a knife through the heart of Congress chief Sonia Gandhi. 

There is no denying the fact that Indian Parliament witnessed many a theatrical acts during the UPA time. The then Opposition had to lynch the UPA-II in the face of damning revelations made by the CAG. The UPA-II was struck by CAG vindicated torrents of scams.

Context is not permanent. And even memories fade away with the passage of time. But wounds of hearts do not heal even after decades.

Of all the attributes, Sonia Gandhi is uniquely gifted with combativeness. And she had been a steadfast protector of the honour of Manmohan Singh. That her son Rahul Gandhi ridiculed him the most is an aberration in an otherwise unique bonhomie of Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh.  

A week has passed by of the Monsoon session of Parliament. No business has been transacted. The Modi government has pinned much hope to push his reform agenda in this session. But the Congress is sizzling in forcing a lock-down on Parliament. 

THE Lalitgate and Vyapam scam are mere pretexts. They would have passed off as "routine" matters in times of cordiality between the Opposition and government. What Sushma Swaraj has done for Lali Modi has been done by every Congress politicians in their days of glory. And the Vyapam scam is a legacy of the Congress government in Madhya Pradesh, which lived through the BJP rule in the state as well. Those who grew in Bihar in 1990s know from hearts that impersonation in entrance and recruitment examinations had been well entrenched. Same continues in Uttar Pradesh and elsewhere also. 

Impersonation and bribing to book seats in colleges and jobs have been Indian story.

Beyond the issues, Modi has not only to pay for the "sins" of BJP as opposition, but also for his brazen approach with the Opposition. 

Modi has charmed most of the non-Congress Opposition parties. He won over acerbic Mamata Banerjee. She made Modi a hero in Bangladesh. His bete noire Nitish Kumar hailed him. Mulayam Singh Yadav seeks cordial relations with him. And it's to the credit of Modi that he scripted excellent working relations with all of them.

But the Congress never figured in the scheme of things of Modi. That he coined "Congress mukt Bharat" surely seems to have outlived the election campaign. He has sought to demoralize the Congress. That the Congress is the largest Opposition party both in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha has hardly figured in Parliamentary scheme of things of Modi. 

And, the Congress has sized the "God send" opportunity to pin Modi down. 

                                                    *****

You may consider buying my book -- The enabler Narendra Modi -- at http://amzn.to/1CR528s   Price Rs 299. Kindle app can be downloaded from Google Play at (for android phone) http://bit.ly/19c6Xpm for PC http://amzn.to/1ImLwl0 for Apple phone/ IPad http://apple.co/1MrRaF5  

The mirror

Thoughts shared on twitter this week:

I write not to inspire, but to keep brain cells alive.

FRIENDS are species fast going extinct.

MARRIAGE is a social contract, yet it makes men and women less social.

ONLY selfless entity is a tree, rest are weights & measurements.

THE selfie epidemic is proof enough of world growing narcissist .

NOISE in television is proportionate to lack of respect for each other in the society.

PUBLIC voice belongs to better offs; the poor don't yet have an audience.

ALL books are ordinary until discovered by 'great' men.

KNOWING when to stop is critically important.

IF you don't sweat out enough, your body suits beehive of ailments.

Note: This is my shortest blog post ever.

Book review: The enabler Narendra Modi

It has been a year since Narendra Modi came to power after leading the Bharatiya Janata Party to a landslide victory in the 2014 parliamentary election.

Modi in a few months after his inauguration shut down the Planning Commission, which by default subverted the idea of India being a federal democracy. All chief ministers as a matter of routine would line up each year to get their annual plan approved by the Planning Commission. Modi has in place inaugurated NITI Aayog wherein the chief ministers head sub-groups on various subjects. But most importantly Modi assured from the ramparts of the Red Fort, that he would ‘neither take bribe nor allow others to do the same (naa khaaoonga, naa khane doonga)’. No Prime Minister before him acknowledged the cancer of corruption and owned up responsibility to crush it down. A year has passed by since the inauguration of Modi and the economy has resumed its journey on the upward trajectory, but the real-estate prices in Delhi and satellite towns around have slumped by at least 20 per cent. The real-estate in Delhi zone thrived because the black money was in ample supply. The tap appears to have been turned off and there is tangible effect on the grounds.

Manish Anand in his book: “THE ENABLER NARENDRA MODI: BREAKING STEREOTYPES” describes Modi as an Emperor of Indian democracy. The author prefers not to draw a parallel but goes on to emphasise that Modi has surpassed the stature of Indira Gandhi of 1971 when she was India’s most powerful leader and had unveiled a single party rule in the country. Modi’s position is both ominous and providential, he says adding his position could be ominous because he may throttle dissent and cause serious damage to Indian democracy. At the same time it could also be providential because he can guide India onto a new path and liberate the shackled potential of the country.

In the preface, Modi has been described as “arguably” India’s first non-Congress Prime Minister. To drive home the point Manish says there were seven Prime Ministers of India, who headed non-Congress governments. Even Atal Bihari Vajpayee of BJP was Prime Minister for about six years. Yet, Modi is the first non-Congress Prime Minister in the true sense. Congress in India is not just a political party but a culture. And that culture was seeded deep into Indian democracy by Indira Gandhi. Her stature was such in her prime time that she ensured Constitution Amendment (42nd) to give India the character of a welfare state. All her successors, barring Modi, bore her imprints in their statecraft.

Carrying forward the argument Manish underscores how PV Narsimha Rao, ably assisted by his Finance Minister Manmohan Singh, sought to force open the window to the world, which was further carried forward by Vajpayee, they could not lay their hands on a formidable electoral template. Both were consequently rejected by the people. Both suffered from contradictions. They wanted to write new chapters in Indian economy and polity yet could not shun the ideological imprints of Indira Gandhi fully. Rao was a Congress man, but had vision to think beyond the Nehru-Gandhi bank of party ideas. Vajpayee was an RSS man, but had co-opted socialists, who were non-Congressmen for just namesake. Vajpayee was a minister in the Morarji Desai Cabinet. The old man was a hardcore Congress man and a rival of Indira Gandhi in her party. Vajpayee propped up VP Singh as Prime Minister also with the support of the Left parties. VP Singh had spent his life in the Congress and quit the party to head the Janata Party, which was essentially a loose confederation of provincial caste chieftains. Vajpayaee in his thoughts was centrist, with little leaning to the right.

In this backdrop, Manish goes on to examine the Congress party and what it stands for. Congress essentially is a political culture wherein the power of decision making is centralized. Popularly it is called a ‘High Command’ culture. This bears strong imprints in the statecraft. Even though India is a Union of states, with much thrust on federalism, Indian statecraft essentially is of centralized planning and decision making. The Centre decides what the states should do. The Centre decides how much money states should spend and under what heads. The Centre decides what laws states should have.

The author has illustrated the point vis-a-vis the Congress by drawing attention to the Indian Parliament enacting a law on acquisition of land in 2013, which was actually a political legislation thrust upon the government due to Rahul Gandhi’s obsession to do the politics of land. Land is a state subject and all state governments have their own respective policies or laws on acquisition of land. Then what was the need for the Centre to enact a law on land and whose amendments Modi is desperately seeking, because he believes it has forced a lock-down on development. If not for Rahul Gandhi ambushing Bhatta-Parsaul to throw his weight behind arguably relatively rich farmers of western Uttar Pradesh, India may have continued with the British time law on acquisition of land. The basic idea is that the Centre essentially lacks trust in state governments to be fair in dealing with its people. And that must sound ludicrous, because the state governments have more connect with the people than the state.

Carrying forward the argument, Manish says Modi is the first non-Congress Prime Minister because he has not been touched by the ideology and culture of the grand old party. Because he was chief minister of Gujarat for about 12 years with strong majority in the state Assembly. He never needed to bend even little to allow Congress to cast its imprints on him. Congress and New Delhi are a lot similar, because they too have the same culture.

The book, by Manish, who is a seasoned journalist covering the political beat for The Asian Age in Delhi, is a treatise on Indian politics and an in-depth analysis of the political philosophy and style of working of Prime Minister Modi and what sets him apart from his predecessors when it comes to vision and setting the agenda for the nation. --------- Book review by Newsroom24X7 http://newsroom24x7.com/2015/06/02/the-enabler-narendra-modi-breaking-stereotypes/

PM Nitish in 2019?

Democracy is full of second chance. 

It all began from the iconic Gandhi Maidan in Patna in October, 2013 where substantial part of the script for 2014 battle was written. In another three months, much of the script for the 2019, still four years away, will be written in Bihar. The outcome of Bihar polls due in October this year will by all accounts set course for a political process with all eyes on the month of May four years later.

Bihar will test the 32 and 68 per cent electoral debate. That Narendra Modi commanded a mere 32 per cent of the vote share in the 2014 polls offered a cocoon of political comfort to his political rivals. The natural consequence was to offer a united political alternative to the 68 per cent Modi naysayers. 

The looming electoral challenge in Bihar made the warring "socialist" satraps to bury their hatchets. They came to believe that if they did not unite they risk being annihilated sooner. The likes of Mulayam Singh Yadav, Lalu Prasad, Nitish Kumar, Ajit Singh and Om Prakash Choutala had seen their political herds quite overwhelmingly demolished by Modi in 2014. They came to believe that the herds were broken because they were fragmented.

The political balloon of Janata Parivar taking a shape is contingent on the outcomes of Bihar polls. If its proponents succeed in Bihar in stopping Modi, it will take wings to fly on the national horizon. If it fails, it will not wither away but jolt the skeptics in the ranks to push their personal ego little back in their calculations. And efforts with full hearts unlike currently when they have pushed Nitish to fight a lonely battle against Modi will be made.

History is not on the side of Modi, for no reformist government has ever been re-elected in the country. Atal Bihari Vajpayee had the candour to advance the elections on the back of eight plus growth rate, yet Congress humbled him. India's economic reform template historically has left millions of poor in the country out of place in the shining moon. That the Maoists registered exponential growth during the times of PV Narsimha Rao and Vajpayee has well been statistically documented to warrant any further repetition.

The anti-Modi political space is currently rudderless and leaderless. They can not tolerate the idea of some one from their ranks emerging their leader. That has been the story so far, but the future is not necessarily hostage to history. And the time is ripe for one of them to sparkle the national political space. 

Among plethora of regional satraps, only Nitish and Akhilesh Yadav stand any chance to play a larger political role at the national level. Akhilesh is still a student of politics and learning the tricks of governance with much strain. But he's just about 40 years of age and has quite a long rope to swing in Indian politics. His father -- Mulayam Singh Yadav -- is in the winter of his career. In the immediate future, Akhilesh may have to cope with a lot of fratricidal war within the extended Mulayam clan to consolidate his political clout.

Nitish has been a turnaround chief minister of Bihar for a decade. His rivals have quite good reasons to call him a political opportunist, for he sheltered in the bosom of one whom he ridiculed during most part of his days in power. Yet, politics is not an abode of permanent friends and enemies; all are circumstantial. Regional satraps know in their hearts that Nitish only has stature among them to challenge the Modi hegemony.   

If he wins Bihar elections, Nitish will emerge a counterfoil of Modi immediately. If he goes down fighting, Nitish will still be in the reckoning. Bihar will have another chance to leave its mark on national political discourse and, hence, the October polls have significance much larger to its local issues. 

                                                               *****

READ MORE on possible political script of India after the Bihar elections in the Book:

Buy at myBook.to/Indianpolitics in paperback & kindle

Breaking stereotypes

A year has passed by since Narendra Modi commanded historic majority to come to power in New Delhi. In the year gone, he took ‘baby steps’ to translate his dreams and promises to people to transform India – socially and economically.  

His economic template is no more different than what Manmohan Singh and his man – P Chidambaram – had pursued. In two full Budgets that his government has presented so far, Modi has not yet unveiled a single step, which could bring in fundamental change to the fate of the country. At best he has been an undisputed king of marketing and sales to re-package schemes and policies pursued by his immediate predecessor to give them the energy and direction which they had lacked.

The book is titled – The enabler Narendra Modi. The reason for such a title is that Modi has given sufficient hints in his one year in office that he is no admirer of India being a welfare state. He has sought to nudge India onto an enabling path. For decades, India stood firm as a welfare state and billions of dollars were poured in hundred of welfare schemes. 

But India’s welfare template suffered from innumerable holes, which defeated the very idea of such schemes, as a class pocketed the wealth meant for the poor of the country. Modi believes as seen in his actions that people need to stand on their feet and they should be provided with enabling platform to transform their lives socially and economically.

Available at Amazaon.in

In the chapter, Herd Breaker, this book reminds the ruling party led by Modi of reasons why the people broke free of several political stereotypes to give a mandate not seen for two and a half decades. Millions of people living on the margins defied the caste identities to back the BJP in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Such people are dreamy and have a habit not to give long rope to the ruling party to fulfill the promises. Modi has unveiled a few of the steps to address to the aspiration of such people, but they seem too futuristic to give immediate tangible benefits to his admirers on the ground.

This book also has a chapter, New Delhi Caucus, wherein Modi’s most difficult challenge is listed and detailed. India is a vast country but irony of the country has been the clout of the ‘New Delhi Caucus’ consisting of bureaucrats, political class, middle men, civil society and judicial activists, which has subverted dreams of teeming millions. Modi has steadfastly gone after the Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) since assuming office and has also sought to correct the ways the judiciary functions in the country. But he has not weeded out the ‘New Delhi Caucus’ completely, which risks his government becoming no different than his predecessors. 

Political opponents of Modi privately admit that he is perched as emperor of Indian democracy. They argue that by all accounts, Modi has surpassed the stature of Indira Gandhi of 1971 when she was India's most powerful leader and had unveiled a single party rule in the country. Modi's position is both ominous and providential. His position could be ominous, because he may throttle dissent and cause serious damage to Indian democracy. At the same time it could also be providential, because he can guide India onto a new path and liberate shackled potential of the country.

Politically speaking Modi is India's first non-Congress Prime Minister. It may sound odd, because there were seven Prime Ministers, who headed non-Congress governments. Even Atal Bihari Vajpayee of BJP was Prime Minister for about six years. Yet, Modi is the first non-Congress Prime Minister in the true sense.

It must be noted that Congress in India is not just a political party, but a political culture. And that culture was seeded deep into Indian democracy by Indira Gandhi. Her stature was such in her prime time that she ensured Constitution Amendment (42nd) to give India the character of a welfare state. All her successors bore her imprints in their statecraft afterwards.

Even while PV Narsimha Rao ably assisted by his Finance Minister Manmohan Singh sought to force open the window to the world, which was further carried forward by Vajpayee, they could not lay their hands on a formidable electoral template. Both were consequently rejected by the people. They suffered from economic contradictions. They wanted to write new chapters in Indian economy and polity yet could not shun ideological imprints of Indira Gandhi fully.  

Rao was a Congress man, but had vision to think beyond the Nehru-Gandhi bank of party ideas. Vajpayee was an RSS man, but had co-opted socialists, who were non-Congressmen for just namesake. Vajpayee was a minister in the Morarji Desai Cabinet. The old man was a hardcore Congress man and rival of Indira Gandhi in her early political days. Vajpayee propped up VP Singh as Prime Minister also with the support of the Left parties. VP Singh had spent his life in Congress and had quit the party to head Janata Dal, which was essentially a loose confederation of provincial caste chieftains. Vajpayee in his thoughts was centrist, with little leaning to the right. 

It's pertinent to examine why Modi is the first non-Congress Prime Minister in the true sense. And for that matter it will equally be important to understand what Congress means as a political culture. Congress essentially is a political culture wherein the power of decision making is centralized. Popularly it is called a 'High Command' culture. This bears strong imprints in the statecraft. Even though India is a Union of states, with much thrust on federalism, Indian statecraft essentially is of centralized planning and decision making. The Centre decides what the states should do. The Centre decides how much money states should spend and under what heads. The Centre decides what laws states should have. 

The easiest illustration of this is in Indian Parliament enacting a law on acquisition of land in 2013, which was actually a political legislation thrust upon the government due to Rahul Gandhi's obsession to do politics of land. Land is a state subject, and all state governments have their own respective policies or laws on acquisition of land. Then what was the need for the Centre to enact a law on land and whose amendments Modi is desperately seeking? Modi believes it has forced a lock-down on development. 

If not for Rahul Gandhi ambushing Bhatta-Parsaul to throw his weight behind relatively rich farmers of western Uttar Pradesh, India may have continued with the British time law on acquisition of land. The basic idea is that the Centre essentially lacks trust in state governments to be fair in dealing with its people. And that must sound ludicrous, because the state governments have more connect with the people than the Centre. 

Modi is the first non-Congress Prime Minister, because he has not been touched by the ideology and culture of the grand old party. He was chief minister of Gujarat for about 12 years with strong majority in the state Assembly and he never needed to bend even little to allow Congress to cast its imprints on him.

This culture essentially is distribution of wealth, centralization of decision making, and sycophancy. Through the welfare core of the statecraft, Congress envisaged distribution of wealth among the poor directly. This subsequently birthed politics of poverty. This book has a chapter on ‘Politics of poverty’ wherein it has been socially, economically and politically mapped for its extent of distortions. This had the collateral damage to Indian ethos in the form of rampant corruption, which spread its tentacles in all walks of lives. 

The mode to distribute wealth to the poor fell prey to the cunning crop of teeming millions who had connections everywhere to pocket at least half the money transferred by the Centre. They infected the political class, judiciary, police, and civil society with their vice. And they gave birth to a corrupt society.

Vajpayee should not be counted among the non-Congress Prime Ministers purely for the reasons because he was clueless to clamp down on corruption and the Congress' statecraft on centralization of decision making exercise. Other six Prime Ministers -- Desai, Charan Singh, VP Singh, Chandrashekhar, HDS Deve Gowda, and IK Gujral -- were either from the Congress having crossed over to other parties in search for greener pastures or were propped up to the post as part of the trick game of the grand old party, which included Choudhary Charan Singh and Chandrashekhar. 

In the chapter, Modi’s 3B, this book graphically captures Prime Minister’s ‘Bold, Brazen, and Bulldozer’ aspect of administration. Modi in a few months after his inauguration shut down the Planning Commission, which by default had subverted the idea of India being a federal democracy. All chief ministers as a matter of routine would line up each year to get their annual plans approved by the Planning Commission. Modi has in place inaugurated NITI Aayog wherein the chief ministers head sub-groups on various subjects.

But most importantly Modi assured from the ramparts of the Red Fort, that he would 'neither take bribe nor allow others to do the same (naa khaaoonga, naa khane doonga)'. No Prime Minister before him acknowledged the cancer of corruption and owned up responsibility to crush it down. A year has passed by since the inauguration of Modi and the economy has resumed its journey on the upward trajectory, but the real-estate prices in Delhi and satellite towns around have slumped by at least 20 per cent. The real-estate in Delhi zone thrived because the black money was in ample supply. The tap appears to have been turned off and there is tangible effect on the grounds. 

Rao and Vajpayee surely put India on high economic growth path. But their times also saw India coming under the firm grip of Maoists. The Red Corridor dotted India right from the border with Nepal to deep forests of Chhatisgarh. The Government of India officially admits 80 districts in the country being in strong grip of Maoists. The Left Wing Extremism spread its influence among poor tribal and Dalit. They gained followers and sympathizers, because poor stayed on margins of the society and the economic growth, which surpassed nine per cent mark in Vajpayee's time, had no effect on their lives. They could not access those benefits on which the Central government spent billions of dollars each year.

In Modi, they sensed a rare opportunity to make an electoral choice to break free from shackles of self-limiting social and economic conditions. Modi is now an emperor of Indian democracy, because he broke the caste and community herds, who by habit and conditioning participated in elections in stereotyped manners. Modi broke many stereotypes and he has to consolidate and further cement his political path.

There is a clear merit in Modi being compared with Indira Gandhi. They share similar political clouts, but differ significantly in their socio-economic outlooks. In the chapter, ‘Politics of poverty’, this book has sought to put the statecraft of Indira Gandhi and her successors in perspective.

... (Read more in the book The enabler Narendra Modi)

Silence of secrets

MANY SECRETS LIE BURIED IN THE WOMB OF SILENCE. 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Finance Minister Arun Jaitely, Rajsthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje Scindia and India's most known son-in-law Robert Vadra are parts of one such mysterious web of silence. 

For details read TURNING OF THE WHEEL chapter in the Book: The Enabler Narendra Modi, which can be bought at http://amzn.to/1CR528s

Despite losing elections and having been instrumental in BJP's humiliating loss at the hands of the maverick activist turned politician, who is also a brutal exponent of the art of politics of muck, Arvind Kejriwal in Delhi, Jaitely stays the most powerful minister in the Modi Cabinet. That Jaitely is the most pedestrian minister ever to head the Ministry of Finance is not a fact unknown to Modi. Yet, Jaitely's comfort is not an ounce less.

http://amzn.to/1CR528s

Vasundhara Raje Scindia is a mass leader who delivered the most humiliating loss to Congress in Rajsthan. She has paced ahead of her own government at the Centre in unveiling reforms. But she is least heard at the national level. Not by default but it appears that by design she keeps distance from Modi and his government at the Centre. Modi is more than eager to para-drop at any place to associate himself with any landmark developmental works. Yet, Scindia chose to inaugurate the Jaipur Metro herself and did not share the honours with any Central BJP leaders. 

That she is miffed with Modi for non-inclusion of her son Dushyant Singh in the Modi Cabinet is an old tale. She had fought the Assembly elections in the state about six months before Modi got his landmark mandate on an issue, which is now buried in the womb of silence. And that was the alleged unscrupulous land deals involving Robert Vadra. Unlike Manohar Lal Khattar, who was hand-picked by Modi as chief minister of Haryana, 

Scindia is a popular state leader and no taint has yet touched her. She is not yet in the leagues of Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who had to complain to Sonia Gandhi against spirited Congress campaign over Vyapam scam in the state. Chattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh's name keeps being tossed in media reports over allegations of favouritism. Scindia has stayed away from such accusations and has a stature of her own in the state and the party.  

Robert Vadra's name was on the lips of Modi at each of the public rally he addressed in 2014 Lok Sabha elections. But "Damad ji" is not troubled a bit despite BJP forming government at the Centre a year ago and in Rajsthan one and a half years ago. BJP came to power in Haryana about six months ago. 

Senior Congress leaders who are not the camp followers of Rahul Gandhi claim to have some insight over the mystery. The book -- The enabler Narendra Modi -- has examined the mysterious silence at length. 

(Note: This post was written before the controversy surrounding Lalit Modi unfolded and has become all the more relevant now.)

Print edition at http://www.amazon.co.uk/enabler-Narendra-Modi-Breaking-stereotypes/dp/1514145766

    

THE ENABLER NARENDRA MODI

AVAILABLE ON AMAZON

BY 1971 Indira Gandhi was perched as an empress of Indian democracy. She had established a political cult with no parallel. After about six years of flux in Indian politics, Indira Gandhi had unveiled a one party rule. She had no challengers. She had run her surgical knife on Pakistan. She midwifed birth of Bangladesh with a surgeon’s precision. She lifted the doom from the conscience of millions of Indians who suffered collective national depression following India’s humiliating defeat at the hands of mighty Chinese army in 1962. The Opposition hailed her as ‘Durga’ (symbol of Shakti, power).

Destiny could not have been more kind to Indira Gandhi. She had her firm grips over absolute power. She was the face of India’s resurgence. She effected fundamental changes in Indian democracy and economy. She gave Indian democracy twin legs of secularism and socialism by incorporating them in the Preamble of the Constitution. India firmly embraced an identity of a welfare state.

The mighty lady is arguably the mother bank of ideology of not only her party Congress, but also the whole lot of socialist parties which dot vast swathes of the country. Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru had groomed her politically and ideologically. He shaped his daughter’s worldview. Destiny was much kinder to her, for Indira Gandhi not only grew in the bosom of Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru but was also adored by Mahatma Gandhi.

Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru was an internationalist. He was arguably the father of industrial India. His daughter was a case in contrast. She was more of a nationalist than an internationalist. Her father co-opted industrial world. She shunned them. Her father knocked at the doors of United Nations for solutions to vexed Kashmir issue. She cared the least for any international power. She was uncluttered and shunned lures to romance an international stature. She charted her own course.

Mahatma Gandhi was arguably her ideological father. Nehru dreamt of India having large industries and equitable distribution of wealth. She embraced his ideas in her statecraft. She anchored her politics on the plank of anti-poverty measures. She was no believer in large industries and the free market economy taking care of the poor. She unapologetically disowned Nehruvian economy through industrialisation and instead believed in direct transfer of wealth to poor.

FOUR and a half decades later Narendra Modi is perched as an emperor of Indian politics. Even his political rivals privately admit that Modi has surpassed the 1971 stature of Indira Gandhi. They firmly believe that India is on the cusp of a single party rule for quite a long time. He has eclipsed all his rivals. He has a grip over absolute power. His stature is a notch larger than that of Indira Gandhi of 1971.

Indira Gandhi incidentally had to struggle through her political course, as she was a contemporary of a galaxy of stalwarts not only within the Congress but outside. If Kamraj and Morarji Desai were her challengers in the Congress, she had to politically outweigh leaders like Jayprakash Narayan, Charan Singh, George Fernandes, Atal Bihari Vajpayee et al. But Modi seems to be lucky as he has none to challenge him inside his party and outside as well on a scale as faced by Indira Gandhi. 

NARENDRA Modi is also arguably the first non-Congress Prime Minister of India. There were seven before him from non-Congress ranks, including BJP's Atal Bihari Vajpayee. But they all bore strong ideological footprints of Congress and carried the legacy of Indira Gandhi in their thoughts, beliefs and statecraft. Modi stands apart because he carries no Congress baggage in thoughts and actions. He could do so because, he does not belong to New Delhi, which has a character of thinking India being just an aggregate of various bungalows in Lutyens' zone.   

In 1991 when Narsimha Rao took over the reign of the country, India was reeling under deep economic crisis. India had to mortgage gold to meet the requirement of current account deficit and pay interest on international borrowings. Rao appointed Manmohan Singh as his finance minister and gave him a template to revive the economy. Singh unleashed a slew of reforms and broke the shackles to put India on the path of free capitalist economy. 

A lot of systemic changes were brought in without being conscious of the poor, as the belief was in growth rate and trickle down theory. No doubt growth was achieved, but a vast population were left on the margins, leading to rise of Left Wing Extremism. Most of the analysis have revealed that liberalisation and LWE witnessed parallel growth. Later, when Vajpayee took over, he and his finance minister Yashwant Sinha followed the same path and Indian growth story reached to its zenith (9+ growth).  

In 2004, the Vajpayee government and the ruling party launched “India Shining” campaign. But it backfired. The left leaning and socialist forces galvanised against the ruling NDA. Even Congress sided with Left policies and managed to become the nucleus for such forces to dislodge the Vajpayee government.

However, it was a travesty of history that the architect of liberalisation, Dr Manmohan Singh, became the leader of the left leaning group of parties. Singh was anointed the Prime Minister of India. As the Manmohan rule progressed, it had the imprint of Sonia Gandhi and the four left parties with more than 60 seats in Lok Sabha supporting the government. Here again Manmohan Singh did not work on his own template, as was the case when he had been the finance minister. Then he worked on Rao’s template’ and as Prime Minister he worked on a combined template of Sonia Gandhi and Left Parties. Thus began the one decade of India being a ultra-welfare state, as the UPA government was repeated in 2009. Several pro-poor direct transfer and right based policies were put in place. They included like MGNREGA, RTE, RTI and food security act.

Now with Narendra Modi at the helm, it seems the state has drifted from its path of ultra-welfare activities and instead sowing seeds of being an enabler for people to avail benefits of the fruits of development. In case of most of the UPA flagship schemes, Modi did not discontinue, but has showed least interest in them in their implementation. Today nobody is talking about MGNREGA and even if some talks are made, they are all about non-payment of wages to labrourers. Even Right to education seems to have become a non-issue. Right to Information too has become irrelevant as many thousand applications are reported to have been pending in the office of CIC. 

In place of these the new government has launched several social sector schemes to empower people living on the margin. But in none of them the state is directly contributing anything. Be it Jandhan Yojna, or Pradhan Mantri Bima Yojna or for that matter Atal Pension Yojana, the basic criteria to avail them is to contribute, though very meager. Therefore, the Modi is government, in the name of welfare, has only been creating platform for people to come and join with their own money and get the benefits of the schemes. And that is the template of an enabler Narendra Modi India is witness to after the 2014 verdict.

The book is available in digital format at following link on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.in/ENABLER-NARENDRA-MODI-BREAKING-STEREOTYPES-ebook/dp/B00YFLMSBE

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