At a rare open session of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national executive meeting on Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is slated to deliver a speech that might shape the political discourse in the run-up to the winter session of the Parliament, and assembly polls in the states of Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.
Significantly, the speech will be open to the media and is set to be telecast live by the state broadcaster Doordarshan. Deliberations of the BJP national executive have so far been a closed-door affair.
The speech comes at a time when the Modi government is facing criticism for the economic slowdown. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has said a stimulus package is underway.
The BJP national executive is set to pass an economic resolution. It is expected to laud the PM's leadership for the roll-out of the goods and services tax (GST) regime by integrating India into a single economic unit and the government's commitment to the welfare of the poor. The resolution is expected to spell out the economic roadmap of the government for the next one year.
It remains to be seen whether the PM uses the occasion to announce any big policy initiative. The PM is known to utilise big occasions to announce narrative-changing initiatives.
Usually, the BJP national executive, chaired by the party president, is attended by its 120-odd national executive members and an equal number of special invitees. However, this time the stage is bigger.
The BJP is hosting an 'extended' national executive. The audience would comprise all of the party's elected representatives in the Parliament and state legislatures. The PM would be addressing BJP's 280 Lok Sabha members, 56 Rajya Sabha members and 1,400 state legislators and legislative council members, which would include 250 ministers from BJP-run governments in the states.
Significantly, September 25 is the birth anniversary of the Jana Sangh icon Deendayal Upadhyaya, whose vision of 'antyodaya' has become the cornerstone of the Modi government's 'garib kalyan' (welfare of the poor) policy architecture since early 2016. It will mark the conclusion of the 'year for the welfare of the downtrodden' announced at the party's Kozhikode national council meeting exactly a year back on September 25, 2016. Monday will also be Panchami, or fifth day of Navaratri festivities when Skandamata, the fifth form of Goddess Durga is worshipped. She sits on a lotus and also holds a lotus in her hands.
There are also indications that the Modi government might bring in a Bill for reserving a third of Lok Sabha and state legislatures' seats for women in the winter session of Parliament. However, the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) constituents like Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan need to be convinced.
The Congress has tried to preempt the PM on the issue. The Congress on Thursday made public a letter that party President Sonia Gandhi has written to the PM on the issue. In the letter, sent to the PM on Wednesday, Sonia Gandhi urged him to take advantage of the BJP's majority in Lok Sabha to get the Bill passed.
The Rajya Sabha had passed the Bill on March 9, 2010. It was stalled in the Lok Sabha when several of the Congress allies opposed it, demanding that seats be reserved not just Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe women, but also those hailing from the OBC community.
The BJP's 2014 Lok Sabha manifesto had committed to ensuring the passage of the Bill to provide one-third reservation to women in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies. "The Congress party has and will continue to support the women's reservation Bill," Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi tweeted.