WHO FINDS love swiping left and right?”; “Isn’t love an emotion that has to come to you organically?”; “But don’t you, like, get murdered on Tinder?”
With these questions weighing heavily on my mind, I took my first, reluctant steps towards the world of online dating three years ago.
I was not hoping for much. As a plus-sized woman with features that don’t fit in the conventionally attractive mould, I was used to being passed over for romantic alliances. And on a platform where the first impression is formed based on something as frivolous as a profile picture, what chance did I have? To my surprise, I found at least five matches within the first few minutes on Bumble. And that was the beginning of what would be a watershed moment in my personal history.
My first date was with A, within 18 hours of us getting to know of each other’s existence. He was cuter than his pictures, an amazing listener, and a cuddler par excellence. It was the best first date I have ever had. We met for another one three days later. He said he wanted me to read him poetry, I said I was more of a novel person. We settled on a short story. He rested his head on my lap as I read aloud. It was as romantic as it gets and completely surreal.
My second date was with D; I connected with him through Hinge. “I find you very attractive,” he said. Now these were words I had never heard being spoken for me before. Ever. I made him say, “Deepika, you are attractive” at least a dozen times and he obliged. He was nerdy, endearingly awkward but attentive to a fault, and single-mindedly focused on not doing anything that made me uncomfortable.
And then I met S. Gifted with dry humour, he cracked me up with every sentence. He was six years younger but with an IQ higher than all the guys I had dated before, combined.
Three years, countless matches and more than my fair share of dates later, if you ask what I feel about my online dating experience, I would say grateful. The men I met through the apps certainly turned out to be better people than those I had met ‘organically’. I stopped being apologetic about my weight and realised I was attractive in my own unique way.
Now, the pitfalls: How can I meet a stranger just like that? What if he is only a serial killer on the prowl? Well, I did take my precautions. I mean sending pictures and contact details of the guy I am meeting to my friend is not the kind of stuff that one envisions for a first date, right? But we do what we got to do.
And, how do I know that he is “the one” by scrolling through a few pictures and a couple of sentences that pass off for bio? What if he is good looking but not photogenic? What if his bio sucks but he could have bowled me over in person? What, dear lord, if there is no bio?
So, in the end, can I say I am a dating app convert? Ah, I wouldn’t commit. My idea of meeting “the one” still remains old-fashioned — I would give anything to bump into him in an old, dusty bookstore. And then him asking me out for coffee, maybe?
But sadly, and shamefully, I am not going to bookshops anymore. In the same vein, I don’t remember the last time a coffee shop took my breath away.
With work friends being the only people I interact with through the week, and girlfriends and platonic guy friends occupying my days off, these dating apps, “inorganic” as they sound, are virtually (pun intended) my only shot at finding “the one”. I just hope that he is photogenic, has a sassy bio, and right swipes me back. And that he is, well, not a serial killer on the prowl.
There are some iconic words or expressions that become immortal and stay with us forever. Inquilab (Revolution) is one of them. It was used for the first time in a slogan Inquilab Zindabad (Long Live Revolution) by Maulana Hasrat Mohani in 1921 and soon became a rallying cry of our freedom struggle.
Now, it’s at the centre of a Delhi High Court deliberation which sought to know the context in which Umar Khalid, accused in the February 2020 riots in the Capital, used the term inquilab, with the judge saying that ‘revolution’ by itself “isn’t always bloodless”.
Before going into the popular appeal of the slogan over the past few decades, we need to know a bit more about someone who coined it. Maulana Hasrat Mohani (1875-1951) was born as Syed Fazlul Hasan in a town called Mohan in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh. Hasrat was his pen name (takhallus) as a revolutionary Urdu poet that also became his identity as a political leader. Hasrat Mohani was a labour leader, a scholar, a well-known Urdu poet and also one of the founders of the Communist Party of India in 1925.
Along with Swami Kumaranand — another important name in the Indian Communist movement — Hasrat Mohani was the first person to raise the demand for ‘Complete Independence’ or ‘Poorna Swaraj’ for India at the Ahmedabad session of the Indian National Congress in 1921. This session was also attended by Ramprasad Bismil and Ashfaqullah Khan (both played an important role in passing the resolution in the general body of Indian National Congress). Hasrat Mohani was elected member of the Constituent Assembly after Independence and was also a member of the drafting committee of the Constitution along with Dr B R Ambedkar. His stress on Inquilab and the slogan Inquilab Zindabad was inspired by his urge to fight against social and economic inequality and of course in his struggle for freedom from colonial oppression.
Before Hasrat Mohani coined this slogan, the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia made revolution symbolic of struggle for oppressed nationalities globally. India did not escape it either.
It was from the mid 1920s onwards that this slogan became a war cry of Bhagat Singh and his Naujawan Bharat Sabha as well as his Hindustan Socialist Republican Association (HSRA). Bhagat Singh was committed to Inquilab or revolution but it was not merely a political revolution he aimed at. He wanted a social revolution to break age-old discriminatory practices. This Inquilab Zindabad was not merely an emotional war cry for the revolutionaries but had a lofty ideal which was explained by the HSRA thus: “The Revolution will ring the death knell of capitalism and class distinction and privileges…It will give birth to a new state — a new social order.”
Bhagat Singh and his Naujawan Bharat Sabha regarded communal amity as central to their political agenda but unlike the common practice, it did not believe either in the appeasement of all religions or in raising such slogans as Allah o Akbar, Sat Sri Akal and Har Har Mahadev to prove their secularism. On the contrary, they raised just two slogans, Inquilab Zindabad and Hindustan Zindabad, hailing the revolution and the country. All those who revel in the name of Bhagat Singh should care to understand the vision he left behind for us as his intellectual legacy.
This slogan got major traction when Bhagat Singh and B K Dutt dropped bombs in the Assembly on April 8, 1929, and shouted Long Live Revolution (Inquilab Zindabad). It was later in the same year that Ramanand Chatterjee, senior journalist and editor of the Modern Review of Calcutta, wrote critically and mockingly about the slogan Long Live Revolution (Inquilab Zindabad). Bhagat Singh could not let it pass and responded by explaining its usage. He said, “The sense in which the word revolution (Inquilab) is used in that phrase is the spirit, the longing for a change for the better. People generally get accustomed to the established order and begin to tremble at the very idea of change…Old order should change, always and ever, yielding place to new…It is in this sense that we raise the shout ‘Long Live Revolution’ (Inquilab Zindabad).”
Bhagat Singh was even more definitive in his statement in the court on June 6, 1929. He said: “Revolution (Inquilab) is not a culture of bomb and pistol. Our meaning of revolution is to change the present conditions, which are based on manifest injustice.” Bhagat Singh agrees with a quote he cites in his prison diary, which says a radical revolution is not utopian, “What is utopian is the idea of a partial, an exclusively political revolution, which would leave the pillars of the house standing.”
The HSRA aimed at such a revolution (Inquilab) which would usher in a new era, demolishing the existing socio-economic and political structure of the Indian society. Their revolution was not for anarchy or lawlessness but for social justice.
Thus, we need to comprehend the meaning of Inquilab or revolution and the slogan Inquilab Zindabad in the context of its history. It will stay relevant till the people continue their struggle against diverse inequalities and oppressions.
The writer is historian and author, and formerly Maulana Azad Chair at the National University of Educational Planning and Administration
On the promenade in Davos this year there was a heavy Indian presence. Major states set up their own investment offices directly opposite India Lounge. Right next door to India’s main office was Russia House renamed this year as Russia War Crimes House. Inside were photographs and videos of mass graves, devastated cities and the heart-breaking testimonies of people who had suffered brutalities at the hands of Russian soldiers. Almost everyone who attended this year’s unusual summer annual meeting of the World Economic Forum visited the Russia War Crimes House to pay homage.
Ukraine dominated the conversations and discussions held at this annual meeting. On the second evening there was a concert for Ukraine that had an audience of more than a thousand people standing up in silence when the Ukrainian national anthem was the first piece played. In all the years that I have been coming to Davos, almost every year since I first came in 1995, I have never attended an annual meeting that was so completely dedicated to a single subject. Putin’s ugly war. Klaus Schwab who founded the World Economic Forum 50 years ago said that in all the years that this Forum has existed, this was the most momentous because it marked a turning point. He said, ‘History is truly at a turning point. We do not yet know the full extent and the systemic and structural changes which will happen.’
In nearly every session I attended I heard eminent analysts of international affairs point out that we are now witnessing a change in the world order that we have not seen since World War-2 ended. There was speculation on whether we were seeing the start of a new Cold War or a continuation of the one we believed ended when that wall came down in Berlin and the iron curtain fell. The difference is that the new Cold War will be between the United States and China. Not Russia. So, did India make a mistake by not condemning Vladimir Putin strongly for starting his monstrous war that seems not to play by any of the established rules of conflict?
It is sad for me to admit this, but it seems that way. As someone who always looks out in Davos for where India stands in the story of the world, I was disappointed to find hardly any mention of our dear Bharat Mata. Indian ministers and officials were present in large numbers as were Indian journalists, but it seemed only other Indians who noticed their presence. This column has said before that we should have condemned in much stronger words Putin’s horrific war crimes of which the first was the unprovoked invasion itself. This week I repeat what I have said in the hope that the mighty mandarins who devise India’s foreign policy wake up to the reality that it is time for us to choose a side.
Here are our choices. We can either choose to stand with other democracies and say loudly and clearly that Ukraine is suffering only because it demanded the right to be free and democratic. It was Ukraine’s right to choose not to be crushed under the jackboot of a brutal dictator who does not allow his own people democracy and freedom. Or we can choose to continue standing with Russia who in the changed circumstances of the world is the junior partner of our worst enemy. In the new Cold War, the side that China leads represents autocracy and brute force. Is that the side that India should be on?
On the top of Raisina Hill in that building we call South Block sits a small army of officials who have grown up admiring the Soviet Union and thinking of it as our forever friend. I have engaged with some of them on the issue of Ukraine and they have repeated ad nauseum that Russia was only responding to deliberate Western provocation in the form of NATO expanding its borders into what the former Soviet Union believed was its sphere of influence. They always preface this by reminding me that it is they who are the experts on geo-political realities and that I am a mere hack poking my nose into an area where expertise is a prerequisite.
Well, let me say to these ‘experts’ that at this present time in world history they are pushing India into the arms of a formation that will be led by China who has shown us many times that it will never be our friend. It was probably on the advice of these ‘experts’ on geo-political realities that our Prime Minister has met China’s communist dictator 18 times always extending the hand of friendship. The last of these meetings was in Mahabalipuram where Xi Jinping and Narendra Modi were immortalized drinking coconut water together. As picturesque a scene as when China’s leader and his wife were photographed on that Gujarati swing. Even as these pictures were being taken China was planning to send troops into Indian territory.
The mighty mandarins of South Block were wrong then and history will prove them wrong one more time if we choose to stand on the side of autocracy and not on the side of democracy. If this is all that these experts in geo-politics and foreign policy can give us, then it is time to put an end to such ‘expertise.’
Last week, I had written that ‘Centre-states relations have never been so fraught’. In the last few days, there has been another flash point: who is doing more to cut taxes?
On May 21, the Finance Minister announced that the government had decided to reduce the “excise duties” by Rs 8 per litre on petrol and Rs 6 per litre on diesel. The notification was apparently made available very late in the day. All channels on that day and all newspapers the next morning assumed — and reported — that reductions had been made in the excise duties (which are shared with the states). It was wrong; the reductions had been made in the additional excise duties (which are not shared with the states).
On May 22, the Finance Minister tried to shame the states: ‘I have reduced duties, now you reduce VAT’. It was an attempt at one-upmanship. As the numbers tumbled out, it became clear that the Centre had no case to ask the states to reduce the VAT on petrol and diesel.
Numbers Don’t Lie
First, let’s analyse the ‘reduction’. The bonanza for the Centre accrues from the Additional Excise Duty (also known as Road & Infrastructure Cess or RIC), Special Additional Excise Duty (SAED) and Agriculture & Infrastructure Development Cess (AIDC) which are not shared with the states. In May 2014, all excise duties amounted to Rs 9.48 per litre on petrol and Rs 3.56 per litre on diesel. By May 21, 2022, the Centre had increased the duties to Rs 27. 90 per litre on petrol and Rs 21.80 per litre on diesel. That amounted to an increase of Rs 18+ per litre!
Next, let’s look at the shared basic excise duty and the not shared RIC which was reduced:
Of the shared tax revenues, the Centre keeps 59 per cent and all the States share the remaining 41 per cent according to the percentages determined by the Finance Commission. All the States together get a pittance from petroleum products: 57.4 paise per litre on petrol and 73.8 per litre on diesel! There is neither gain nor loss, of any significance, through Basic Excise Duty.
The real source of revenue is the not shared excise duties. Having raised it by Rs 18+ per litre of petrol and diesel, on May 21, 2022, the Finance Minister reduced it by Rs 8 and Rs 6 per litre, respectively! This is what I call Rob Peter More and Pay Peter Less!
VAT is Main Revenue
It is obvious that the states get practically nothing from the revenues raised by the Centre from petrol and diesel. Their main source of revenue is VAT on petrol and diesel (the other source being taxes on liquor). It is noteworthy that the states’ own resources as a proportion of total revenues is dwindling. Exhorting the states to cut VAT on petrol and diesel is akin to asking the states to beggar themselves: they will go broke and be obliged to borrow more (with the permission of the Central government) or carry a begging bowl to the Centre for more grants-in-aid. The little financial independence the states’ have will evaporate. Yet, four states have made cuts in the VAT: Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Maharashtra and Rajasthan.
Need Total Review
Neutral observers have argued that the entire gamut of Centre-states’ fiscal powers and relations must be comprehensively reviewed. In particular, the working of Articles 246A, 269A and 279A relating to the GST laws must be reviewed. States must have more financial powers to raise own resources. It is a fact that states that are starved of resources do not devolve sufficient funds to the urban and rural local bodies and the result is the 73rd and 74th Amendments to the Constitution are lying in deep freeze. Neither funds nor functions nor functionaries are made available to the municipal and panchayat bodies.
The virtual monopoly of financial powers in the hands of the Central government has led to concentration of other powers in the Central government. The Centre has encroached on the legislative domain of the states (e.g. the farm laws). The Centre has exceeded its taxing powers (e.g., IGST on ocean freight, as pointed out by the Supreme Court). The Centre has often exercised its executive powers to override the executive powers of the state governments (e.g., transfer and ‘posting’ of the Chief Secretary of West Bengal on the day of his retirement from service in order to punish the officer concerned and overawe the state). The Centre’s policies tend to impose uniformity throughout the country (e.g., NEET, NEP, CUET). There has been a serious erosion of federal principles. The danger is that, in due course, federalism will be junked and India will become a unitary state — a proposal that was unambiguously rejected by the Constituent Assembly.
You decide, what do you want? One India with de-humanizing oneness and uniformity across subservient states or a Federal India that is enriched by vibrant, co-operating and competing states?
The Dalit Panthers turns 50. Celebrations have been organised in my hometown in Maharashtra. An international Dalit Panthers-Black Panthers Conference is being hosted in India’s hinterland for the first time. The Nanded Ambedkarites have decided to throw a party that would consist of intellectual discussions, speeches, film screenings, exhibitions, performances on traditional Ambedkari music and Dalit rap. In a first, Black Panther icons such as Michael D McCarty and Henry Gaddis have been invited to attend the conference alongside veteran Dalit Panthers’ leaders such as J V Pawar.
No other city in India has organised such a conference. This is partly to let the world know that many activities happen in smaller parts of India but they remain unreported and unknown.
Dalit Panthers was started by first generation educated Marathi youth in Mumbai in 1972 but was dissolved five years later due to State pressure, internal ideological conflicts, and to make way for the next generation of thinkers to adopt their version of resistance. The Dalit youth living in Mumbai slums were frustrated with the State and its apathetic machinery. In response to the growing statelessness and insecurity, they blew fire like a dragon putting to flames the mirage of India that was commemorating its silver jubilee.
At the time, Raja Dhale, one of the co-founders of Dalit Panthers, compared the Tricolour to the sari draped around a Dalit woman. A Dalit Buddhist woman was stripped naked in public by the entire village in Maharashtra’s Brahmangaon. Dhale asked Indians if a Dalit woman’s respect was more important or the Tricolour, because the punishment for disrespecting the Tricolour was more severe than that of stripping a Dalit woman.
The Dalit Panthers had an impressive presence in cities and its influence started growing in villages as news of their work spread. The style of the Panthers, known as “Pantheri”, was to use language and words as an armament against injustice and violence.
The Panthers were literary marvels. Their speeches were seditious for the Indira Gandhi government. They were a national threat. Many regional parties, especially in Maharashtra, rose to fame just by opposing the Dalit Panthers. At times, police and intelligence units would be ready to arrest the speakers immediately after their speeches.
Such was the terror of the Panthers that wherever an atrocity against Dalits took place, entire villages would take refuge at the police station. “The Panthers are coming” threw casteists into panic. Villages continue to remain a ground for practising the thousand-year-old caste system. Separate settlements and reliance on landlords are imposed on groups made untouchable in society. If an untouchable dares to change his/her given place and demands fare wages, or resists sexual abuse of their wives, mothers or sisters, or sends their children to school, it invites a violent response and social boycott.
When the State failed Dalits, Dalit Panthers became an option. This enactment was not limited to street fights and protests. Many locals partook in the change they were seeking with the Dalit Panthers. The State put them behind bars. The college going youth were slapped with criminal cases so that they could not complete education nor get a government job.
The Dalit Panthers wave was strong and forceful. Almost everyone who believed in justice looked at them with admiration. It was primarily a movement led by intellectuals. Many youth of the ’70s era, who later became professionals and leaders, reminisced about their work with the Panthers.
However, it was not always a clean picture. The Dalit Panthers as an organisation was not always an ideal body. It had united rivers of many places and with that came tensions. It remained an urban-centric body with leaders guiding it from faraway places. Though there were many charismatic leaders, only the ones reported about get a mention. Dalit Panthers of Maharashtra inspired the Gujarati, Kannada, Tamil, and North Indian Panthers. All were suave and were led by sophisticated thinkers. A huge corpus of literature is available in regional languages about them. It remains to be translated.
The Dalit Panthers remain incompletely theorised. Dalit Panthers was an ideology and as well as a sight of the Dalit response to injustice. It was a teaser of the Dalit might that exercised their birthright to resist violence. They never were a subdued people. That is why their resistance is extraordinary for they refuse to be dictated by the terms set by the oppressors.
Dalit Panthers is not just a temporal figment that existed in the past. It is louder now. It exists in the people and their actions. Dalit resistance is known by many names and it continues to reverberate through their embrace of love and action. Commemorating the Panthers is to reunite with the universalist position of the Dalit programme. It is an important memory that could guide many through their successes and pitfalls.
Suraj Yengde, the author of Caste Matters, curates the fortnightly ‘Dalitality’ column
In hindsight - and that is the only view available now -the only 'good thing' to come out of the fiasco involving the arrest, incarceration and reputational damage of Aryan Khan is that he is a 'high-profile case'. The clean chit given by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) last week, and the ordeal Khan had to bear since October, must become a textbook study of how to conduct investigations in this country.
The fact that Khan was denied bail twice by a magistrate's court and then a session's court before the Bombay High Court discovered good sense shows that intimidation and harassment has reached systemic levels that need to be uprooted. Khan, among others, had been accused by the NCB of possessing drugs, something that seven months later the same NCB's special investigation team (SIT) has found to be untrue. The damage done, this case and its architects must serve as a call to ensure such intimidation and attempts to deliver pitchfork justice does not recur.
This was an all-too-visible case of a bad, and indeed mala fide, investigation that included data privacy being abused with decontextualised WhatsApp messages leaked and conclusions gleaned from matters that had no bearing to the case both in time or terrain. For Khan, it would be quite well within his right to press charges against the NCB for the ordeal he has been made to go through because of law and order (sic) authorities, as well as members of the lower judiciary, essentially going on a witch hunt.
Those involved in the sad, bad and dangerous affair must be brought to book to set an example. It is NCB's reputation as a 'drugs-buster' that needs to be recovered, along with an honest appraisal of how due diligence in investigations must be conducted in this country.
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With inflation running above the mandate given by Parliament to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), governor Shaktikanta Das has outlined the steps undertaken to reverse monetary policy that led to an unscheduled rate hike earlier this month. The central bank must answer to lawmakers if inflation persists above 6% for three consecutive quarters. On current indications, inflation based on the consumer price index (CPI) is unlikely to return to within the 2-6% band by June, when two quarters of the target breach are over. But the circumstances have been extraordinary, and the RBI's response has not been delayed. With GoI chipping in with export curbs and duty cuts on food and fuel, which are driving the current phase of elevated prices, the monetary policy committee (MPC) of the RBI may be able to flatten the interest rate hike curve to achieve price stabilisation.
Das made the point in an interview with this newspaper last week that the RBI's rate action in May was mindful of not pushing economic recovery off the rails. Both the build-up to the 40 basis point (bps) increase in the repo rate as well as the quantum of change were governed by the intention of not adding another shock after the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. Going forward, Das sees a sunset to the RBI's rate hiking cycle, which could be brought forward by a supportive fiscal policy and changes in the external environment. In this, the governor is following a tradition among central bankers of talking down prices when inflation becomes persistent.
India is plugged more into the world economy than it was a decade ago, and imports both inflation and recession quicker. The RBI's monetary response is constrained by policy actions in advanced economies and the growth prospects of the world economy. By sounding less hawkish than his peers in other countries, Das is catering to India's fragile recovery from the pandemic and a new set of vulnerabilities emerging from a global food and energy crisis. The burden of these will be borne inordinately by the world's poor.
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The portraits of 75 women from the Vedic era to modern times are likely to adorn the walls of the new Parliament building as part of the celebrations marking 75 years of India’s Independence, this newspaper reported on Sunday. The women selected for this project will likely span a diverse cohort, from spiritual leaders and mythological figures to war heroes and social reformers. This is a good step. Symbolism is important, especially at the highest seat of India’s democracy. Current and future generations will have role models to look up to, and it will send a strong signal about the importance of women leaders in the country’s progress and independence.
And yet, the presence of these portraits will also underline the gaps in representation of women in Parliament, and state assemblies. The number of women Members of Parliament (MPs) was the highest in 2019, but at 14.4%, it is still far lower than their share of the population and electorate. This number has been rising but sluggishly, and is not commensurate with the growing role of women in deciding electoral outcomes. The last few election cycles, both at the Centre and in the states, have seen women voters outpace their male counterparts in turnout and female voters have changed the arc of electoral politics by making politicians – from Narendra Modi and Naveen Patnaik to Nitish Kumar and Mamata Banerjee – focus on nurturing this unique vote bank. Women leaders aid the cause of not only representation but, as substantial political literature shows, better and more responsive policymaking.
Political parties, therefore, must learn from the successful experiment at the panchayat level and field women candidates from diverse backgrounds, and quash discredited theories of winnability. Women are already shaping India’s social and political future. It is time more of them have a seat at the high table of democracy.
The spectacular collapse of a much-hyped Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) investigation into alleged drug conspiracy charges against Aryan Khan holds lessons for those in charge of important agencies, policymakers and people. Since the arrest of actor Shah Rukh Khan’s son in October last year, several alleged procedural lapses had come to light, only to be capped by the anti-drug agency’s chargesheet in court last week admitting that corners were cut in what turned out to be an ordinary drug case, not an international conspiracy as had been alleged by the agency at the time.
The sordid episode showed that few lessons had been learnt from the botched probe into the Sushant Singh Rajput case of 2020, and harsh comments by the judiciary had not tempered any inclination by certain officers to go after high-profile targets and play to the plaint galleries. It underlined the dangers to civil liberties by the increasing usage of harsh provisions of stringent laws, such as the 1985 Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, to deny bail and restrict mobility. Both the Rajput and Khan cases proved how quickly baseless narratives can be stitched together with selective leaks and targeted propaganda, and highlighted the need for the government to insist that all investigations, however high-profile, must always follow procedure laid down by law.
The NCB chief has indicated that the agency has asked its investigators to now only focus on high-value, drug syndicate busts and not bother with petty cases that can be dealt with at the local level by the police. He has also indicated that the probe will be evaluated for lapses and intention. This is a welcome step, but the investigation must answer the questions that many citizens will be raising now – whether the agency overstepped its remit, bringing its investigative independence into question, or whether an officer and his team misused their powers to prove a point, or even worse, peddle influence or attempt extortion. The answers will be uncomfortable, but necessary to initiate a structural change and avert a repeat in the future.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government at the Centre completes its successful eight years under the dynamic and decisive leadership of Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi. The last eight years have been a trendsetter for India. The nation has moved from the politics of casteism, dynasty, corruption and appeasement to the politics of development, growth, unity and nationalism.
This remarkable journey has strengthened democracy in its real sense by empowering the marginalised sections of our society — from poor and backward classes, Dalits and minorities, tribals and oppressed classes to women and youth. It has also been a journey of changing the Indian psyche — from “nothing is possible in this country” to “everything is possible if the government and the people have the will and commitment”. The commitment of 1.35 billion Indians towards the vision of PM Modi reflects on the ground. It also proves that if a leader has a policy and programme, intention and dedication, every challenge can be addressed, every problem can be solved.
The nation has not just changed under the leadership of PM Modi, but a new chapter of remarkable growth and fast-paced development is also being written. Today, eight years of changing India reflects in every Indian’s eyes. In the last eight years, our poverty rate reduced from 22% to 10%, and extreme poverty fell below 1% and remained static at 0.8%. Our per capita income doubled while foreign reserves also increased two-fold. In the past 70 years, only 637,000 primary schools were constructed, but under the Modi government, 653,000 schools have been built so far. Under this government, 15 new All India Institutes of Medical Sciences were sanctioned, out of which 10 have become operational and five are in advanced stages of construction. The number of doctors jumped by 1.2 million. India created the second largest road network in the world, and our solar and wind power generation capacity doubled in the past five years.
Year after year, India broke records in food grain production. In 2012-13 our food grain production was 255 million tonnes, which increased to 316.06 million tonnes in 2021-22, the highest ever in our history. Despite the global economic slowdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic, India managed to clock a record in merchandise exports at $418 billion in the last financial year. Under the Modi government, new benchmarks were set. As India battled the pandemic, it was PM Modi who led from the front. He gave India not one but two “Made in India” vaccines, and opened government coffers to provide free rations to over 800 million Indians for the past two years at an expenditure of ₹3.40 lakh crore.
There are several firsts associated with the last eight years. The common man got free medical insurance coverage through Ayushman Bharat Yojna, while farmers and labourers got a monthly pension. For the first time, farmers started getting the benefit of the Kisan Samman Nidhi for farming purposes, and it was our government that formed a policy for organic farming.
Then there are several path breaking schemes — Jan Dhan Yojana, Ujjwala Yojana, Kisan Samman Nidhi, Ayushman Bharat Yojana, Gareeb Kalyan Yojana, Swachh Bharat Yojana, Awas Yojana, Jal Jivan Mission, Digital India, Gram Vikas Yojana, Goods and Services Tax — which not only empowered citizens but also strengthened our economy and made India resilient and self-reliant. Schemes such as Atmanirbhar Bharat, Vocal for Local, Gati Shakti Yojana, PLI (production linked incentive) catapulted India to the top of the global world order.
In previous regimes, the willpower to deal with perennial problems was lacking and everything was left to fate. PM Modi’s innovative and decisive approach in dealing with problems made all the difference. His firm resolve led to the scrapping of Article 370, construction of the grand Ram Temple in Ayodhya, abolition of instant triple talaq, passing of the Citizenship Amendment Act and surgical strikes on terror camps across the border. His unique style led to the identification of 1,800 old laws which had become redundant, and the scrapping of 1,450 of them. No previous government had thought of this. This made lives simpler for citizens and improved government efficiency.
Foreign policy is one field where India has excelled under PM Modi. From Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan to Ukraine, India showed the world how effective foreign relations help in saving the lives of citizens. India also led from the front when it came to the issues of terrorism, global warming, Global Solar Alliance, effectiveness of Quad and our strong relations with our neighbours. These eight years were also a period of India’s cultural resurgence. Yoga and Ayurveda caught the world’s attention, and India’s lost cultural and religious icons regained their glory, including the transformation of our holiest places such as Kashi Vishwanath Dham and Kedarnath Dham.
Under PM Modi, the BJP broke records and reached new heights. Today, the BJP is the world’s biggest political organisation with 180 million members. In 2014, the BJP and its allies had governments in seven states, today we have our governments in 18. For the first time, the BJP crossed the 100-mark in the Rajya Sabha and broke electoral records in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Assam, Goa, Manipur and Tripura.
The secret behind the BJP’s success under PM Modi is the trust and blessings of Indians that our party won. People today know that there is a government at the Centre that works for their welfare and is committed to Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas, Sabka Prayas.
Under PM Modi, the BJP is committed to transform India, make India a country where all are one, all are happy and prosperous. It is time again to take a pledge to work hard and commit ourselves to make India a happy and prosperous nation.
JP Nadda is national president of BJP The views expressed are personal
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s supporters are celebrating his ninth year in power, the opposing parties are desperate to grab political space. Will Modi be able to match Jawaharlal Nehru’s third consecutive general election triumph in 2024? Will the Opposition be able to thwart his efforts?
The election campaign is going to pick up towards the end of the year, but the Opposition seems to be in disarray. The Congress, of which people once had high expectations, is fraying at the edges. The Nehru-Gandhi dynasty has failed spectacularly in pulling the party together and winning elections for years now. The Grand Old Party is a shadow of its former self today with more and more high-profile desertions. The Congress being in such tatters is the main impediment to Opposition unity.
In the last election, the Congress faced off against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 191 seats. In 2019, it received approximately 119.5 million votes, accounting for around 20% of the total voter turnout. No regional party can match this on its own.
Over the last two years, the Congress has performed poorly in assembly elections held in Bihar, Bengal, Uttar Pradesh (UP), Goa, Manipur, Punjab, and Uttarakhand. It did not win a single assembly seat in Bengal, and it won only two in UP. In Bihar, the Rashtriya Janata Dal’s Lalu and Tejashwi Yadav believe that they lost the election only because, driven by an old political friendship, they gave the Congress 70 seats. This is why Tejashwi did not opt for any collaboration with the Congress in the Legislative Council elections.
Some strategists feel that if efforts are focused on relevant issues going forward, Modi’s charisma will begin to fade. Perhaps this is why, on Gandhi Jayanti, Rahul Gandhi will begin his Bharat Jodo Yatra.
To underscore this point, analysts frequently mention the successful agitation carried out by Jayaprakash Narayan in the 1970s and Vishwanath Pratap Singh in the 1980s. What was the environment in the country when Jayaprakash Narayan began his agitation in 1974? We had been independent for 27 years at that time. There were many people around who had fought for or sympathised with the freedom movement. They believed that true freedom had still not been won and were willing to fight for it all over again.
With Independence came an increase in urbanisation and several new issues. A sizable proportion of the youth believed we had been duped. At the time, youth all over the world were agitating for freedoms in one way or the other. Che Guevara and Fidel Castro were considered heroes in India at the time.
You may recall that Naxalism, which evolved from Naxalbari, was rapidly spreading in many states. Mao Zedong was also a hero in the eyes of these youth. Rebellious expressions were visible in literature and cinema; Amitabh Bachchan, the angry young man in films, seemed to speak for millions.
In such a situation, when Jayaprakash Narayan called for a “total revolution,” there was already widespread support for it. But thanks to the political ineptness of the leaders of that time such as Morarji Desai and Charan Singh, these sentiments were dissipated. Indira Gandhi came back to power. However, she was assassinated on October 31, 1984.
Her son, Rajiv Gandhi, riding a wave of sympathy generated by her murder, stormed to power with an unprecedented majority of 414 Members of Parliament. Three years later, he became involved in the Bofors controversy. As a result, Vishwanath Pratap Singh emerged as a hero in 1988 and went on to become PM the following year. People began comparing him to Mahatma Gandhi in terms of integrity, but he couldn’t keep his hodge-podge government running for even two years.
This was a second blow to the dreams of India’s youth.
Those planning to stop Modi in his tracks seem oblivious to the reality that the Opposition no longer has a leader of the stature of Jayaprakash Narayan. Unemployment was a problem back then, and it is still a problem today. Inflation was a problem back then, and it is still so today. But the Opposition does not appear to be in a position to do much about all this because of its shortcomings. In addition, there does not seem to be any taint of corruption on either Modi or his ministers.
Take a look at the state of the governments in Maharashtra and Jharkhand, for example. Regardless of how much the Opposition claims that central agencies are being abused, it is clear that they act only when they have secured incontrovertible evidence.
Due to investigations by central agencies, two Maharashtra ministers have been arrested, and a third is under the scanner. The manner in which raids were carried out in Jharkhand has also sparked controversy. Even anti-BJP leaders are unable to see any reason to be hopeful in the face of such a situation.
This is why, in his ninth year, Narendra Modi is the only PM, after Jawaharlal Nehru, to have had such a smooth ride. This is yet another feather in his cap of enviable achievements.
Shashi Shekhar is editor-in-chief, HindustanThe views expressed are personal
Renewable energy (RE) is vital to building a resilient and secure future energy system. However, it has also become clear that RE is not as benign as we presumed. While RE generation is zero-carbon (barring some biofuels), there are emissions at other points of its lifecycle, such as during raw material extraction and equipment manufacturing. Then there are RE’s detrimental impacts on biodiversity and ecology.
The projections for RE-related waste are staggering when our landfills are overflowing and the recycling infrastructure is ill-prepared to handle this waste. And then, conflicts over land rights are already affecting green energy transitions. Would asking the RE industry to scale-up production to address the current energy crisis lead to more challenges and conflicts?
We don’t think this is inevitable. We think the RE industry has opportunities to drive positive change across all these areas. Our coalition of research organisations — Forum for the Future, WRI India, TERI, WWF-India, BHRRC, and Landesa — have been working with RE developers, equipment manufacturers, investors, banks, and civil society organisations to understand how the scaling of RE in India can be ecologically safe and socially just. We believe that RE shouldn’t stand merely for renewable energy but responsible energy.
To avoid negative impacts, the RE industry must act on four principles: First, it must actively promote universal labour, land, and human rights; protect, restore and nurture resilient, thriving ecological systems; commit to participatory governance principles; and believe that resilient communities and an inclusive workforce are critical to their success.
The first step has been to acknowledge that these issues exist. Now, we need leading RE sector players to build a shared understanding of how to avoid the extractive mindset that drove much of the fossil fuel-based energy production.
The RE sector must also study environmental and social impact assessments to prevent and mitigate negative impacts. Finally, they must enhance their RE procurement processes, and include designing for circularity and traceability in the supply chain.
The most powerful way of encouraging many of these areas is to demonstrate the art of the possible. At the Responsible Energy Initiative, we have a cohort of ambitious industry actors, including Renew Power, JSW Energy, Wipro, Navitas Solar, Fourth Partner, EverSource Capital, Axis Bank, TPG Investors, British International Investment, National Solar Energy Federation of India and the Global Wind Energy Council, which are developing ‘Made in India’ manufacturing plants and also developing pioneering approaches to labour rights and resource use, and a protocol for how to drive greater transparency in the value chain.
This is not to say that other actions aren’t taking place. For example, significant efforts are also being made to address solar photovoltaic waste. However, while these are useful, we also need to be designing for circular resource use from the start. We need more systemic action, and it needs to become the norm quickly.
This opportunity is not unique to India. Across the world, countries are experiencing the same RE-related challenges. We must act now. The Responsible Energy Initiative in India seeks to lead by example, showcasing how responsible RE can help enhance energy security, mitigate the climate crisis, and help drive a deeply transformational clean energy transition.
Anna Biswas is director, Forum For The Future, India, and Bharath Jairaj is director, energy programme, WRI India The views expressed are personal