NARENDRA MODI FAILING ON MANY FRONTS
By Harihar Swarup
Narendra Modi has completed nearby half of his five-year term as Prime Minister. Various news channels and newspapers have commissioned surveys to find out his popularity rating, achievements and failures. Off to a dazzling start when he took over in May, 2014, Modi’s popular support graph has now dipped sharply but he still continues to be more acceptable leader compared to Rahul Gandhi, Arvind Kejriwal, Mamata Banerjee, Jayalalitha and Nitish Kumar.
If Lok Sabha elections are conducted now, the BJP may not get a majority; it is too early to talk of 2019 when general elections are due. Modi has to demonstrate tremendous all-round skills to master what is most difficult task; governing a country like India. He must speedily win public approval for the rash of programmes he has announced, leaping over many hurdles.
He must show endurance, which he did while winning political support for the much delayed Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill. He has also to display power and agility needed for field events to deal with many challenges he faces, be it cross-border terrorism, economic instability, social distress or religious disharmony.
The strain of delivering on the great expectation that his victory evoked, began to set in. As people’s impatience with Modi’s inability to usher in ache din grew, his government’s popularity in three subsequent surveys held at six months intervals, began to fall precipitously.
In a February 2016 survey the NDA coalition numbers plunged alarmingly. The BJP’s share dropped far below the historic majority it had achieved during 2014 general elections. Worse for Modi, the Congress-led UPA, which had reached as low as 59 seats in the Lok Sabha elections, began to show signs of a major revival. Rahul Gandhi’s political fortune showed a remarkable resurgence and he appears to be emerging as a challenger to Modi.
Despite strong Third Front leaders winning state assembly elections—like Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal, Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu and Arvind Kwjriwal in Delhi— they are showing no sign of challenging the primacy of Modi and NDA government. Nitish Kumar and Kejriwal, though, are narrowing the gap with Rahul as the opposition leaders best capable of taking on Modi in his bid for re-election in 2019.
There is recognition that the NDA government’s performance has somewhat improved in the past six months. Worryingly for Modi, on key issues such as jobs, inflation and corruption, people are far from satisfied. With the BJP tally remaining well below the majority mark in Rajya Sabha, it remains dependent on its NDA allies and others outside to see it through Parliament. So Modi and the BJP still have to retrieve ground that they have conceded in the past two years in power.
The most obvious explanation for Modi’s rebound is what poll Pundits call the TINA (There is no alternative) factor. If one looks across political spectrum, there is no serious challenge, within his party and outside it, to Modi’s primacy.
The major reason why Modi was voted with a massive mandate—the first government in 30 years to have a majority of its own—was that the people wanted a decisive leader heading a government that would arrest the drift the country experienced under UPA-II. But a series of missteps on the farm front, aggravated by two successive droughts, electoral defeats in Delhi and Bihar, saw the Modi government’s rating plummet, though the prime minister’s personal popularity remained high.
While Modi and the NDA have staged a strong recovery, the perception still remains that his government is yet to deliver on several key issues. Given the opposition’s inability to knit a cohesive alternative to the BJP, Modi despite the blemishes, is still perceived as the best leader to steer the nation through these troubled and testing times.
While Modi always led from the front, in the past six months, he showed he had learnt from his missteps and revved up governance. He shook off his anti-farmer and anti-poor image by making the single-largest allocation of funds towards shoring up the farm sector and alleviating poverty since independence.
He also pumped huge amounts of government funds into infrastructure projects for roads, railways, ports and housing to stimulate the economy and provide employment. The Prime Minister then boldly went ahead and further opened key sectors to Foreign Direct Investment.(IPA Service)