Silencing the critics

Centrestage: Inside the Narendra Modi Model of Governance

Author : Uday Mahurkar

Rs 499

This book is a refreshing read as it delves into what captured the nation’s imagination towards Narendra Modi and also indicates how he is turning his critics into his staunch supporters, writes RAJESH SINGH

No article or book on, or an interview with the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi is ever complete without the mention of the 2002 incident of Gujarat, which many commentators variously describe as a communal riot and an anti-Muslim pogrom that Modi’s Government in the State had unleashed or at the very least, covertly supported. In the 10 years that have gone by, not a shred of evidence which links Modi or his regime to the violence has stood the scrutiny of the courts. Yet, the issue has been kept alive by vested interests, compelling even those people who wish to move ahead to take note and positions. It is, therefore, refreshing to read Uday Mahurkar’s book, Centrestage: Inside the Narendra Modi Model of Governance, which delves into what has captured the nation’s imagination.

Critics of the book may say that the book represents the author’s blinkered approach, where he without raising a doubt accepts the ‘development package’ he had been presented with by the State’s authorities. They may also claim: ‘I said so’ on noticing that the foreword of the book has been penned by a staunch Modi-supporter and internationally known economist Jagdish Bhagwati. To them, it will be a small matter that professor Bhagwati of the Columbia University has been a close friend of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and, therefore, can hardly fit the template image of a Modi-acolyte. Yet, if the noted professor is today a firm admirer of the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate and declared the availability of his expert services to a regime that Modi may lead, should the expected-to-be Prime Minister desires, it is because he is convinced by the Gujarat Model, warts and all. Should we hold this against him and vilify him? Not if you are not a member of one of those hate-Modi brigades who have made slandering the Gujarat Chief Minister into a profession.

Mahurkar’s account is not imaginary stuff concocted out of thin air, sitting in air-conditioned rooms and feasting on propaganda material without a murmur of dissent — though this what his critics (he must have added them in figures numbering several thousands since the book hit the stands) would like to believe. As a senior journalist, he has been covering Gujarat since 1987, years before Modi burst on the State’s scene in a meaningful way. He has had a ringside view of Modi’s rise from a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh pracharak to the Chief Minister to the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate. He has covered developments in Gujarat inside out — the various communal riots that hit the State before Modi came to power, natural disasters like earthquakes, droughts, and the response of the Governments in power. The book, therefore, is not a sanitised account. True, Mahurkar has consumed a dominating part of the 190-plus page book to the successful governance model that Gujarat has had in the last 10 years of Modi’s rule, but he has also written about the failures of certain schemes that had begun with much fanfare, and analysed the cause of those failures.

If it makes Modi’s critics happy, here are some of the ‘misses’ that Mahurkar has listed in the book. He writes, “The implementation of the Narmada project during the first 7 years of his rule raises questions on his governance. The project remained almost in a static stage till 2008, thanks to his wrong selection of officials to run the project and failure to give it top priority.” But the author adds that course-correction was thereafter done and by mid-2013, the project was back on track with achievement to show. Mahurkar notes, “Had Modi adequate attention to the Narmada project…agriculture growth rate of Gujarat would have been close to 11or even 12 per cent instead of around 9 percent…”

Mahurkar also lists Modi’s wrong choice of Vice Chancellors to universities and his poor handling of the controversial cement project near Bhavnagar which cost him the support of an influential Legislator, as among the few minuses of the Chief Minister.

However, the list of Modi’s achievements which have won him admiration from across the country and admirers like professor Bhagwati is longer, and Mahurkar naturally takes much space to discuss the ‘pluses’. The more compelling of them in terms of sheer audacity, grandness of scale and eventual success, are Jyotirgram Yojana (the electrification scheme which transformed the face of rural Gujarat especially, after separate feeders were erected to supply power for farming and village homes), Krishi Mahotsav (the agro-event which has contributed to Gujarat being among the best States in agricultural growth); and Vaanche Gujarat (a Statewide campaign to enhance not just literacy but inculcate the reading habit among Gujaratis).

In addition, there are the more toasted achievements such as the fiscal turnaround of the State. Mahurkar writes, “Such was the financial situation in 2001 due to poor financial management that the State Government had to take nearly 15 to 20 overdrafts from the RBI to run the show and meet basic requirements like payment of salaries to Government employees.”  Once Mr Modi kicked in the various fiscal measures, the change began. “The practice of taking overdrafts from RBI to run the show stopped way back in 2004”, Mahurkar notes. Alongside, the Modi-led State regime had revived the State’s plan size too. When he took over in 2001, the State’s financial health was so critical that he had to “scale down the annual Plan size by Rs 500 crore to Rs 6,000 crore in 2003-2004 to arrest the financial paralysis.” The author notes with approval that in February 2014, the Plan size “has increased by almost ten times to over Rs 59,000 crore.”

On the energy front, it is not the Jyotirgram that is a shining star. Mr Modi unleashed a series of reform measures that included clamping down on power consumer defaulters — however big or mighty they may have been — and refusing to capitulate to either strong-arm tactics or political expediency in the name of vote-banks in the process. The results took a while in coming, but they are now there for the world to see.

Towards the very end, Mahurkar succumbs to the temptation of politics, wondering aloud whether the general perception that “Modi is totally unfit for coalition politics” is correct. We must leave the readers with this insightful remark from one Vidyut Thakar who, the author says, says has observed the Chief Minister’s rise over the decades. “When the balance is against him, Modi is not averse to coming on the bargaining table, but he plays for high stakes.” Indeed, the stakes are high.