There is only one way forward. And there is, among the visible choices, only one person best suited to lift the nation out of a septic swamp
Anyone who speaks in public, whether master orator or ordinary word-shuffler, comes to a platform after some preparation. The one eventuality no can quite prepare for is a crisis; and there is no crisis greater for an individual than a threat to one’s life. At that moment, the reaction is more likely to emerge from a heart than the head.
The bombs that began to burst at Narendra Modi’s Patliputra rally were aimed at the crowds, of course, but also at him. His instant response was to ask a powerful question of both Hindus and Muslims that went to the crux of the principal challenge before our nation, and included its solution as well. He asked these two great communities of our country to choose: they could either fight each other, or together they could confront that shaming curse called poverty.
This placed everything in context and priority: we need peace in our country as an absolute fundamental necessity. This gives us the chance to rescue an economy that has been sent to hospital in the last decade before it sinks to a deathbed. The primary purpose of economic growth is to lift the poorest from their awful misery; and this can best be achieved only when every Indian, across differences of creed and caste, works hand in hand. We either move together or we barely move at all. It was an incisive definition of inclusive growth.
At a time when Modi could have been forgiven for being emotional, he was practical, clearly focused and determined to pursue an economic vision. This fit a pattern. In a speech on August 15 last year, he said that the religion of anyone in public service was the Constitution of India. A compilation of his views by Siddharth Mazumdar, released a few weeks ago, opens with this sentence: “The essence of secularism is that all religions are equal before the law.” It asserted that sarva dharma sambhav was the philosophical magnet that united India from an ancient age.
At a time when Modi could have been forgiven for being emotional, he was practical, clearly focused and determined to pursue an economic vision.
But how do such principles accord with the fact of the Gujarat riots, which is a constant theme in all attacks on him? I raised questions at the time of the riots as much as any other journalist did.
Paradoxically, these questions were answered over 10 years by the UPA government.
There has never been, since independence, such intense scrutiny, or such absolute determination to trace guilt to a chief minister, as Modi faced from institutions loyal to the UPA government over two full terms. Every relevant instrument of state was assigned the task of finding something, anything that could trace guilt to Modi. They could not. The Supreme Court, which is above politics and parties, and which is our invaluable, independent guardian of the law and Constitution, undertook its own enquiries. Its first findings are in, and we know that the answer is exoneration. Moreover, there has been judicial accountability to an unprecedented degree in Gujarat. We are still waiting for justice in a hundred previous riots.
One suspects that only some politicians have a vested interest in the past during an election when Indians want to vote for their future.
The young want a government that gives them jobs; parents want their entrepreneurial skills to turn into food on the plate, into schools for their children, and into a horizon of hope. When Modi talks of building a hundred new cities, they can see jobs and opportunity rise with every floor of a new township. One significant indicator of the public anger lies in a statistic: employment has grown, on an average, at only 2% in the past decade. If the rate was higher in the first five years of UPA, when the economy was faring better, then one assumes it must have sunk to less than 2% in the second UPA term. A nation that was soaring on achievement and hope has sunk into depression.
We need a national recovery mission. Only someone who has delivered can offer a credible promise of leading such a critical mission. For those on the wrong side of 30 or 40, five years is just another passage in life. For those who are 20, five years is the difference between aspiration and despair. If a young person does not find a job in these five years, he or she begins to lose that vital energy which comes from self-confidence. If the young do not power the economy then the economy will be stuck in the quagmire of idle waste.
There is only one way forward. And there is, among the visible choices, only one person best suited to lift the nation out of a septic swamp. You know his name, as well as I do.
