Rahul Gandhi makeover: Shine in Rahul's shadow

Bhukh hai to sabra kar, roti nahi to kya hua,

Aajkal Dilli mein hai zere bahas e mudda -- Dushyant Kumar.

CONGRESS vice president Rahul Gandhi suddenly discovered Dushyant Kumar. This claim may be in the realm of suspicion. More apt would be to say that Rahul began dishing out couplets of Dushyant Kumar from his book of Ghazal Saaye mein Dhoop. Rahul, who had been struggling to find a coherent narrative, began hitting headlines by borrowing from the pathos in couplets of Dushyant Kumar.

Dushyant Kumar is hailed as Mirza Ghalib of Hindi. He himself had been a self proclaimed admirer of Ghalib. He admits that he did not have even the hundredth of the talent of Ghalib. Yet, he notes that his pains are no less than that of Ghalib, which made the Urdu poet an immortal for those who feel their hearts beating.

"I don't believe that my pain is less than Ghalib's, or I felt them with lesser passion. It may be possible that each may have such false notion concerning his or her feelings. But history is testimony to all my pains," Dushyant Kumar writes in the introduction to "Saaye mein Dhoop". 

Dushyant Kumar had been a favourite for speakers in 80's and 90's, who sought to make an impact with their audiences. Sometimes, it did not matter whether the couplets of Dushyant Kumar related to the topic at hand. But, it had been fashionable to recall a few couplets with flair to convince the audiences of speaker's depth in literature. 

Kahan to tay tha chiragan harek ghar ke liye,

kahan chirag mayassar nahi shahar ke liye;

yahan darakhton ke saaye me dhoop lagati hai,

chalo yahan se chalen aur umra bhar ke liye.

Above couplets came out in all flair from a senior IPS officer in 90's, while speaking at an annual function of a local club. Dushyant Kumar's yearnings to run away from the pathos had no relevance with the topic of the evening. Yet, the couplets gave depth to his speech, with all clapping and admiration coming in plenty.

Rahul has dished out many other couplets from "Saaye mein Dhoop" with high stake Gujarat

Assembly elections playing out at a time when he's set on the path to take the baton from his mother Sonia Gandhi for the leadership of the party.  Indeed, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is the source of pathos for the couplets dished out by the Gandhi scion.

Within the BJP, Modi detractors have seemingly refreshed their memories of the lines of "Saaye mein Dhoop". Ab kisi ko bhi nazar aati nahi darar, ghar ki har deewar par chipke haen itne ishthaar came handy for Shatrughan Sinha when he sought to lash out at Modi and his "council of sycophants" while speaking in the company of Sitaram Yechury, Sharad Yadav, Ali Anwar, D Raja and others.  

THIS blogger, while mapping the political journey of Rahul, had previously termed him a submarine politician. That adrenaline shoots in his veins in the times of elections followed by long phase of hibernation in cooler chimes had indeed been Rahul's imprints on Indian politics. His arguably incoherent articulation of issues critical to a large number of people had been well documented. He once believed that escape velocity would be required for the people to break off from poverty; or, that power had been poison; or, the Indo-US nuclear deal had been critical to light the bulbs in the huts of Kalawati to ensure her daughters went to schools. His intellectual imprints on India's socio-political canvas have surely left fodder for analysis. 

Now that Rahul is diving into the Dushyant Kumar's treasure, it would indeed be key to find if he has begun connecting with the people. Himachal Pradesh is currently one of the few states being ruled by the Congress. Barring Karnataka and Punjab, the Congress could hardly count any other big states in its kitty. Thus, it must have been incumbent upon Rahul to defend Himachal Pradesh fiercely from the BJP chief Amit Shah, who is seeking a literal translation of Congress mukt Bharat.      

But the Gandhi scion could spare just one day to address three rallies in the hilly state where the octogenarian Veerbhadra Singh was left to fend with himself against the combined might of Modi-Shah, besides open rebellion from within the party ranks. 

Women in Kangra advising Rahul to work on his communication skills

On the campaign trail, this blogger sought out from the locals in the state if they missed Rahul at a time when they had to make the crucial decision to choose party/candidate to vote for. From Kangra to Palampur, from Hamirpur to Dharamshala, the common refrain was that the locals did not miss Rahul in their states. Some had suggestions for Rahul, that he should cease to be in a hurry to explain an issue. He should connect with the people; he seems to be in a great hurry; he's angry most of the times without explaining hos source of anger, opined a section of voters in Himachal Pradesh, which also included a few who hailed from the local Congress units.

"Rahul seems angry all the times. But we don't understand reasons for his anger. He should explain with little more leisure. He needs to improve his communication skills," Ritu Dadhwal (In pix) told this blogger in Jwalamukhi in Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh, 

Dushyant Kumar is a literary delight. His pathos survives. But Rahul may need to go beyond quoting from  "Saaye mein Dhoop".

Bullet train: Leap of faith

That the 508-km long Ahmedabad-Mumbai high speed train, which is loosely called a bullet train,  will give a negative political dividend to Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a certainty. Yet, this may be the only saving grace for the listless Modi administration on economic fronts in over three years in the office. The cost at Rs 1.10 lakh crore is jaw-dropping, but the spin-offs in a few decades will offset all the financial pain.

THE French Rail Corporation (SNC) in the business viability report had unequivocally stated that a

Shinkansen bullet train

standalone Ahmedabad-Mumbai high speed rail corridor with speed in access of 350 kmph will have to be funded by the government. That it will not make profits for years is certain, which will keep the private investment away, the report submitted to the Ministry of Railways noted, while adding that the world over such endevour has been publicly funded.

Not that the Ahmedabad-Mumbai high speed rail could ever be profitable, the report had stated, and for such a scenario to emerge the Railways would need to spread a garland of inter-connected semi-high speed rail lines to help flow strong traffic. Such garland will surely take a few decades more to become a reality.  The SNC report had set the chill in the Ministry of Railways. The enthusiasm for the ambitious project had been dulled.

Japan is battling deflation. The population is aging. The manufacturing capacity there is in access of local and offshore demands. The capital is equally in access. The Japanese industries have to set up shops abroad to stay afloat. The idle Japanese capital needs avenues to sink in and make money. That China has cheap labour with population still younger along with manufacturing base at a scale which still awes the world long put Japan in quandary. 

But India and Japan are bound by historical bond of culture, besides absence of even an iota of animosity. Indeed, the high speed rail corridor project had been lying idle since the time of the UPA headed by Manmohan Singh. The first definitive agreement between the two nations had also been inked during the times of Singh. Yet, the Congress which swore by Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) to win polls and trumpet its brand of politics could never believe in the capital intensive high speed rail corridor. The Congress knew well, the bullet train will hit with bullet speed in damaging the vote base. 

In contrast, Modi believes that the bullet train will help him get votes. And, he's not wrong either. 

THE state of economy since 2011 had slipped into a self-limiting warp. The appetite for private investment had been doused. The sword of fiscal deficit launched P Chidambaram and Arun Jaitely

afterwards into obsession for expenditure squeeze. The economy cried for a spark. This is vintage Modi, the Narendra Modi of Gujarat, that has been unveiled by the ground breaking ceremony of the high speed rail corridor project. Modi, the man who could execute expansion of Sardar Sarovar Project which lifts the flow of Narmada river by not less than 25 floor high building in a course of a few Kilometers, is promising to rediscover himself at a time when his government has to bat out the last few over in which he has to score unbelievably large runs.

Undeniably, the faith of rail travellers in the railways has been left shaken due to spare of mishaps in the last two years. Every train journey now looks suspect. Suresh Prabhu, who had been Minister for Railways for almost three years, though of taking up new projects -- new lines, capacity augmentation and fresh products. He forgot that the Kakodkar Committee in its report long back had cried for immediate modernization of at least 19,000 kms of rail tracks. No surprise, that derailments of trains constitute more than 50 per cent of the rail mishaps, which in turn most likely take place due to poor conditions of tracks. Prabhu forgot his basic mandate and lost the job.

In speed, the Railways has traveled least in the last four and a half decades. Premier trains of today -- Rajdhanis -- were launched in 1969. The inaugural Mumbai-Thane had run at a speed of 30 kmph. The average speed of the passenger trains now is just 60 kmph. The goods trains travel at much slower speed. Thus, the Railways could never gain the confidence, capacity and capability (3Cs) to break free from the status quo.   

THE Ahmedabad-Mumbai high speed rail corridor will give the Indian railways the 3Cs to give the mobility solution to more than one billion people of the country. That hundreds of high ranking railway officials have already gone leadership training is already part of the India-Japan story. The upcoming high speed rail institute in Gandhinagar should be giving India not one but hundreds of E Sreedharan. The 3Cs will help Indian Railways to compete with China for rail projects in South-east Asia and Africa is another in-built sub-text of the story. That IRCON has already executed a few of the long route rail projects in South-east Asia is well known. 

Indian economy in the short term will gain from the pump-priming effect, as Rs 80,000 crores of the total project cost would be spent within the country on civil and associated works, which will generate demands for steel, cement, labour. Unlike the Dadri-JNPT dedicated freight corridor, Indian companies could also be the lead partner for bidding the civil works. Besides, the strong mandate for Make in India will hasten technology transfer in running high speed trains which over the years will have its own spill over effect.

Japan is sinking in Rs 88,000 crores in the Ahmedabad-Mumbail high speed rail corridor. This money is going into a standalone project and it was not available for the existing demands of the Indian Railways. The Ministry of railways will roughly contribute about Rs 20,000 crores in the course of next six years. 

That the money in parts will be returned to Japan beginning 15 years later at an interest of 0.1 per cent was the most low-lying fruit that Modi had to pluck to give the spark to the economy with just about 16 months to go for him to seek votes again.

Rising spate of unemployment in India: Is Modi riding a tiger

BJP top guns are sweating hard to talk gains of demonetization. Hard-selling his book "I do what I do", Raghuram Rajan has  emerged within a few days a nemesis of the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Desperation on the back of mainstream media not believing numbers thrown by government to talk achievements is sinking in fast. In three years, Modi seems high on the steroid administered by achievements on borders with China and Pakistan, but quite fragile on domestic front, with unemployment at its peak.

Anand Mahindra is arguably a straight-talking India Inc man. He is also one of a few Indian industrialists who has been expanding his businesses. But he too is not an industrialist who invests in employment intensive sector. He prefers businesses with light manpower. And, so does most of the Indian industrialists, with vision of just immediate future. Expansion of the industry and the consequent job growth happens when industrialists think long into the future with certainty of growth. 

India undeniably is caught in a time when vision is short -- ultra short.       

"In the special economic zones (SEZs) of Gujarat, most liberal labour laws are in practice backed by

world class infrastructure. yet, I've not seen industrialists taking advantage of facilities to invest in employment intensive industries," first vice-chairman of NITI Aayog Arvind Panagariya told Mahindra in a discussion with an intention to genuinely know why Indian industrialists have aversions about businesses which could trigger employment generation.

Before Mahindra could shed light of his wisdom, a senior officer, betraying a sense of resignation, stated that the ministry of labour had engaged the industry captains and sought to know from them what all changes they wanted so that they could take up businesses with employment generation. She rued that no concrete suggestion came. "We talk of labour regulations impeding on industrial growth. Yet, when asked what all regulations should go, there are no answers from the industry," the officer told Mahindra.

At last Mahindra replied, with an admission that Indian industrialists are only attempting to imitate the outsiders setting up shops in the country. "We are best following others. The foreigners are coming and setting up units in the country. We may be watching them out and follow them in the coming years," Mahindra quipped.

The Economic Survey of 2015-16 pegged unemployment at five per cent, a notch higher than previous year. Subsequently, situations have only worsened. The informal sector accounts for bulk of employment in the country. The construction sector has been the bellwether of employment. They lay battered following demonetization. The result was reflected well in the numbers, as the first quarter gross domestic product (GDP) of 2017-18 slumped to 5.7 per cent. Rating agencies rushed to scale down growth projection to 7 per cent. Growing at 8 or more per cent GDP growth rate is a distant dream for at least a couple of years by all accounts.

So, what happens to employments in a country where 68 per cent of population is in working age group. Number of the working population is on an ascent only. Millions of youth are passing out from schools, colleges and institutes with prospects of job market further squeezing. That they would become employer is looking a crude joke after all the talks of Start Up India, Stand Up India turning out to be all about App and portal makers bottled in Bangalore and Hyderabad.

"We've given 80,000 jobs in various government departments in the last one year. But they youth don't remove their names from the employment exchange till they get the jobs of their choices. That explains why there is not much of change in the job data," the Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani reasoned at unemployment rising to quite high level.

The organizational secretary of Swadeshi Jagran Manch (SJM) Kashmiri Lal claims that the Chinese goods coming in the country account for 50 per cent of the Indian manufacturing outputs. "Chinese firms are making a clean profit of Rs 65,000 crore ($9 billion) annually, besides having a Rs 7 lakh crore trade value. If only we can replace them with our domestic manufacturing capacities, the impact on employment could be evident," Lal opined. 

But Lal will not admit that the Indian industrialists long back turned into traders of Chinese goods.

So, what happens to the promise of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at a rally in Agra in 2013 that if the BJP was to be voted to power 10 million jobs would be created. The BJP chief answers that

historical riddle with number-crunching from Mudra scheme. A month back, he had quipped that 7.28 crore Mudra beneficiaries have gained from the loans, which now has surpassed 8.25 crores. They're employers also, the BJP leaders would make others believe. But the Mudra beneficiaries are mostly in the semi-urban and rural areas, yet the economy hasn't got any evident shot of adrenaline for demands.

Yes, the stock market is at a record high. With banking instruments offering only an inflation neutral returns and the property option flattened, surplus money is pouring in strong stream to the Dalal Street.

With employments on freeze, Modi may well be riding a tiger.

  

Is genie back in bottle?

Euphoria over lapping Nitish Kumar in the saffron camp has a subtle hint of faultline in the great Narendra Modi script.

THE BJP chief Amit Shah idolizes India's greatest political strategist Chanakya and Hindu revivalist Veer Savarkar. Chanakya believed in a strong and rigorously trained army to expand frontiers of the kingdom and also to ward off foes. Savarkar envisioned homogenous Hindu society, and mostly undertook covert operations in pursuit of his goals. Shah believes that he's a blend of both the historical icons. 

Fired by his expansionist burst of adrenaline, Shah is eyeing to win Odisha and West Bengal. He even thinks that Kerala too will be in saffron kitty at not so distant time. The saffron flag is fluttering all across the North-east. Team Amit Shah is camping determined to uproot Manik Sircar government in Tripura. 

Yet, the saffron expansionist zeal was piped to give Nitish Kumar

lease of life to rule Bihar. Fresh from delivering morbid shock to rivals in Uttar Pradesh, the BJP seemingly acted as the henchmen of Bihar chief minister to help him shed the secular skins. From splashing documents of land deeds dating back to 1990s, Nitish's Sherpa and Bihar BJP's sole anchor Sushil Kumar Modi had been a man on a mission. Suddenly, he had all the revenue records to link Lalu Prasad clan in quid pro quo land deals.  One may wonder what the duo had been doing with the same set of records in their possession during NDA reign in the state during 2005-13.

Central investigating agencies, the CBI and ED, true to their wont of being more loyal than the king, hunted several locations to add thrill to the political drama. Lalu Prasad, convicted for corruption and barred from contesting election, was again certified corrupt along with all his clan members.           

Nitish Kumar and his Sherpa Sushil Kumar Modi delivered the alibi for another dramatic and thrilling swapping of places in the state politics. Kumar is a politician without a party as noted by the historian Ram Chandra Guha. And Sushil Kumar Modi has of late been a politician dumped by his party. Their umbilical cord helps both to remain relevant in the Bihar politics. 

That Nitish Kumar could have been a challenger to Narendra Modi had been proven a pipe dream in the course of political events after the 2014 verdict. That Modi with Kumar in saffron camp is running away with the 2019 poll is, thus, a convenient spin to a story palatable to the people. 

Despite being the deputy chief minister of Bihar for more than seven years, Sushil Kumar Modi had failed to win Amit Shah's approval to become chief ministerial face of the party in the 2015 state elections. Still, he slogged and logged highest number of manhours to stall the Mandal backlash. Shah, the Chankaya of BJP, schemed from the Chanakya hotel in Patna only to flounder and subsequently sink his party to the humiliating loss in the state. Only a year ago, the BJP had been unstoppable in Bihar, with the party led alliance winning 33 out of the total 40 Lok Sabha seats.

Sushil Kumar Modi had been slighted in the run up of the 2015 Bihar polls and thereafter, with team Amit Shah experimenting with new set of nondescript leaders to stage a comeback in the state. That Shah despite being on a whirlwind intensive tour of several states to deepen the foothold of the BJP failed to make his presence felt in Bihar in the last two years made it evident that he had not yet recovered from the 2015 drubbing.

With the BJP ship adrift on the high sea of Bihar, Sushil Kumar Modi had only to strike at the right time to take full control of the party in the state, and that could have been possible only if his aka, Nitish Kumar, was back on his side. 

The Bihar chief minister had teamed up with the BJP to put the genie of social justice in the bottle in 2005. Lalu Prasad, who has been the sole custodian of the politics of social justice in the state, hurtled to the wilderness in the next one decade. 

Time seemed to have been ripe for writing political obituary of the messiah of Mandal. But his nemesis only uncorked the bottle to

give him another day to live in 2013. Once out of the bottle, the king of "MY (Muslim-Yadav)" proved his mettle becoming the largest party after the 2015 verdict. Back in power with two sons -- Tej Pratap and Tejashwi Prasad, Lalu Prasad was remote controlling bureaucracy and gaining political strength each day. 

Time to put the genie back into the bottle had come again. And bottle was readied, but only the time will tell if the genie actually went inside. That saffron juggernaut prostrated before Nitish Kumar is indeed all to see at a time when Amit Shah is seen unstoppable.