Narendra Modi. The name resonates
many feelings (positive more than negative nowadays). But before the elections
and from 2002 to 2014, Modi has been the centre of many a controversy. He has
battled them all and has emerged as the Prime Minister of the country. But what
does the Modi phenomenon mean for me? It means a lot. I asked myself this
question – why was I so happy that Modi has practically turned the BJP/NDA
around and has single-handedly taken over the reins of the country? How does it
have any effect on my life and my routine?
Till I was in college, I was
pretty much unaware of politics and the ramifications of the massive societal
changes happening around me. The first
recollection that I have of involving myself in political affairs in any form
or manner was voting in 1998 for the BJP. I felt relieved (though I don’t know
why) when Atal Behari Vajpayee was made the Prime Minister of India. He served
a full-term and more till 2004. In that period, the Indian economy saw the
telecom boom, the ITES revolution and the sudden expansion of the national
highway network. Before nay-sayers begin booing; let me clarify that statement.
- Though privatization of the telecom industry was commenced in 1991 under PV Narasimha Rao, real progress happened after the BJP government opened the flood-gates by privatizing VSNL. After Tata took over, it enabled private players to foray into the Indian market. After 2000, the government became much more liberal in giving licenses to foreign players. This was helped further by the New Telecommunications Policy, 1999.
- Again, though the ITES sector was theoretically commenced after privatization in 1991, real progress came after the Atal Behari Vajpayee government set up the National Task Force on Information Technology and Software Development. It set up a lot of policies, procedures and benefits for indian IT players and brought the country up to speed with the rest of the world. The Information Technology Act 2000 further acted as a catalyst for increasing investor confidence in e-commerce and e-business.
- Expansion of highways is also largely credited (and rightly so) to the Vajpayee government. As soon as it was formed, the NDA government set up National Highway Development Project (NHDP) which commenced and was partly successful in delivering the ambitious plan of the Golden Quadrilateral. The plan took care of the main north-south and east-west connecting corridors and highways connecting the four metropolitan cities (Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata) They have now been fully paved and widened into four-lane highways. Some of the busier National Highway sectors in India have been converted to four or six lane expressways. For example: Delhi - Agra, Delhi - Jaipur, Ahmedabad - Vadodara, Mumbai - Pune, Mumbai - Surat, Bangalore - Mysore, Bangalore - Chennai, Chennai - Tada, Delhi – Meerut, Hyderabad - Vijayawada and Guntur - Vijayawada.
In 2004, I was commencing my job
at Wipro Limited. I was at a situation where I occasionally read the news,
infrequently saw news channels and still more infrequently interacted with people who were
interested in current affairs (I know; it was a sad state of affairs). I was
also dating (my first relationship) and I was pretty much self-involved
to the point of not caring too much about social issues plaguing India. I did
not vote in the general elections of 2004. I remember feeling quite confident
that with so much good work under its belt, the BJP was sure to win. I also
remember feeling what difference would one vote of mine do? I was relaxed and
confident that the BJP would come to power again and I could go back to my
self-involved life without a care in the world. Other people would take care of
the country’s problems and I wouldn’t have to bother. Most analysts believed
the NDA would win the elections; this assessment was also supported by opinion
polls. The economy had shown steady growth in the last few months and the
disinvestment of government owned production units (a continuation of India's liberalization
policies initiated in the early 1990s) had been on track. The Foreign Exchange
Reserves of India stood at more than USD 100 billion (7th largest in the world
and a record for India). The service sector had also generated a lot of jobs.
The party was supposed to have been riding on a wave of the so-called
"feel good factor", typified by its promotional campaign "India
Shining".
Boy, was I in for a shock! The
UPA, led by the Indian National Congress won 218 seats (an increase of 83
seats) and the NDA slid to 181 seats (a decrease of 89 seats)! I was
flabbergasted.
Was performance no guarantee of
success? Was merit no surety of reward? Was honesty (relative) no benchmark of political
success and good governance? The ten years that followed solidified this feeling.
In Maharashtra, Sharad Pawar and his coterie had begun making inroads into the
political affairs of the state. Since 1999, Maharashtra has been ruled by the
INC-NCP alliance; and they have wreaked havoc not only in governance but also
in the cultural psyche of the Maharashtrian common man. The INC-NCP alliance
has systematically side-lined values like honesty and meritocracy and instead
inculcated values like racism (based on caste) and sycophancy. And the result
is there for all of us to see. Maharashtra is a racist and hypocritical
society. Maybe the INC-NCP is not the root cause of this behaviour, but it sure
has promoted and used these tendencies very nicely to ensure that they stay in
power.
Typically, I detest even
mentioning castes in any of my posts but to make my point clearer I am going to
have to do that in this particular paragraph. So ingrained are our racist
tendencies that we automatically ask for the last name of an individual to
gauge his or her cultural identity. None of us can deny doing that. In
Maharashtra, a first name is no identity at all. A person will automatically
bracket you into a “stereotype” right from being introduced to him/her by
asking your last name. Marathas treat Brahmins with disdain, Brahmins are wary
of Marathas, the “lower” caste hate the Brahmins, The Marathas are
condescending and patronizing towards other “lower” castes and the venomous
story goes on and on. I am a staunch atheist and I completely disregard castes,
races and other stereotypes altogether. Despite this, I have been bracketed
into a “stereotype” many times solely on the basis of my Marathi accent (which
is characteristic of a particular type of caste and I can’t help that) and my
last name. I credit the INC-NCP combine for taking advantage of this tendency
of Maharashtrians and using it to the hilt to ensure that they keep the caste
equation fizzing. And if the people in power do something, it is but natural
that the same behaviour percolates down to all aspects of life. Racism is
embedded in our society to the point of over-ruling individual identity and I
blame the INC-NCP (the NCP more so) for this extremely vile aspect of our
culture. The nadir of this tendency is reflected in the recent Kharda murder
incident where a bunch of hooligans of an "upper-caste" ruling community tortured and
killed a Dalit boy just because he spoke to a female member of the family.
You can read about the incident here.
From an era where the great
warrior king Shivaji was able to bring together all people of all castes to
fight against the Mughals; from an era where the extremely capable Peshwa
Bajirao I (Thorle as he was called) laid the foundations of a mighty Maratha
empire which under the Peshwa rule, stretched right up to Peshawar; from an era
where Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak brought together a dysfunctional Indian
society to rise against British imperialism . . . to an era where we squabble
amongst ourselves on the basis of caste, fight amongst ourselves over a scrap
of the reservation quota, allocate assembly seats on the basis of caste rather
than performance and debase the very concept of unity in this vast democracy.
We’ve sunk a long way. And we have the INC-NCP to thank for that.
The basis of this racism is the
assumption that your small-knit community is more important than someone else’s
small-knit community. It does not take a Sherlock Holmes to figure out what
happens next. Shrinking the community concept even further, the INC-NCP
promoted nepotism like never before. The result is there for all to see –
- Indian National Congress – The Gandhi family
- Nationalist Congress Party – The Pawar family
- Shiv Sena – The Thackeray family (The Shiv Sena would have been a slight deviation had it favoured Raj over Uddhav; but it was sadly not to be)
Each family favours its progeny
and its coterie over member of another family and their coterie. Sharad Pawar
pushed his nephew Ajit and his daughter Supriya into important political
positions. Narayan Rane pushed his sons into politics. Murli Deora
automatically paved the way for his son Milind Deora. Shankarrao Chavan similarly
paved the way for Ashok Chavan. Maharashtra politics is basically about
families who have ganged together like bands of scavengers in prehistoric times
or like feudal families who lorded over their territories in the Medieval Ages.
Since 2004, I have seen so many of
these examples in all walks of life. I have seen honest people pushed out of
the system. I have seen upright individuals being shunned as too rigid. I have
seen law-abiding citizens derided as losers. This has percolated down to our
personal lives as well. I see people take for granted the fact that your caste
is your identity. I see educated people practice racism in their lives and
think nothing of it. I have seen these examples all around me. The perception
that meritocracy is dead in India had firmly seated itself in my psyche. I
continued to act honestly in my own personal life. I would (and still do) stand
at red lights when vehicles all around me are jumping the gun. I didn’t (and
still don’t) litter in the streets when people around me were (and still are) throwing
trash willy-nilly. I was (and still am) as honest as possible in my dealings
with people around me. I avoided (and still do) lying to the point of it becoming
a problem. I did it. But I was a pessimist at heart. I was bitter.
The last straw for me was Narendra
Dabholkar’s death. Why was he killed? All he did was advocate freedom from
superstition. The utter futility of his death and the callous way in which the
INC-NCP alliance has run its investigation boils my blood. I met the man. I
have worked with him. He was nothing but honest. He personified rationality in
all he did. He was simple, humble and he had the one trait that Maharashtra so
badly needs – integrity. He fought against religious superstition all his life.
And he was gunned down in broad daylight. This is the religious intolerance
that the INC-NCP has bred in our culture. This is now Maharashtra’s culture. By
the time Modi was made the prime ministerial candidate for the BJP, I was a
complete cynic. Not just a cynic, I was (still am to some extent) a
misanthrope.
Against this backdrop, Narendra
Modi arrived on the national stage as a sign of hope. A man who had risen from
humble origins and was yet the Chief Minister of Gujarat. A man who transformed
a state from a riot-ridden stink-hole to one of the fastest growing states of
India. I was cautiously optimistic. But I was still cautious. I wanted to be
sure of myself before endorsing him (even in the limited social circle that I
mingle in). In August last year I and a friend of mine took a road-trip to
Gujarat to observe basic infrastructure and form a prima facie opinion of his
handiwork (superficial as it may be). I was impressed. You can read about my
road-trip here. After years of believing that all hope was lost for Indian
society, here was a man who meant business. No scandals against his name. No
progeny to favour. No wealth from illicit means. No personal agenda except one
– India. I then proceeded to read as much about him as possible from all
possible sources. From his worshippers to his detractors. I read everything I
could lay my hands on. And slowly I was convinced that he was the right choice
for us all. I hoped that he would win.
Since that time, all his actions
have confirmed to his stated goals – India first. The strong way in which he
banished the absolutely bureaucratic concept of GoM (groups of ministers), the
decisive way in which he sent a signal to the civil services about punctuality,
his well-thought nationalist stand regarding the WTO trade deal (you can read
about the whole mess here), his media-savvy strategy of creating a BRICS block
as a viable option to American hegemony in world affairs have all sent the
right signals to the world. That meritocracy is back in India. Once more, the
thinker is more valued than the operator, the honest is more valued than the
corrupt. There is still room for me and people like me in this country. Room to
live a life that is guided by moral principles. 2014 is the year of revival. Of
resurgence. It is the beginning (I hope) of a new era in Indian social
transformation. We must not let this opportunity go to waste.
From being a cynic and a pessimist a couple of
years ago to today; where I am optimistic about our country, our culture
(non-religious), our potential and our abilities, ‘tis is indeed a big change.
And if I can change, so can we all. We must banish the green monster of racism,
religion and lacuna from our hearts and rise towards the best within ourselves.
We must nurture that part of us which wants to rise above what we are today and
become better every day. The part of us which thinks about right and wrong. The
part of us that disregards stereotypes and thinks rationally. The part of us
which is impartial and honest. The part of us which makes us hold our head high
and proclaim patriotism all year round, not just on one day. We must nurture
that part. Only then can we begin to collaborate in the grand vision which our
forefathers lay down in the idea of India and which Modi so passionately
proclaimed yesterday on occasion of India’s 68th Independence Day.
Of a society that is based on mutualism and cooperation. A society that is
based on performance, merit and honesty. A society that is based on
rationality. A society that we can call Incredible India. And mean it.
