Governance is Plus and Minus

It is a truism that governance of any kind is not always wholly right or wholly wrong; it is a mixed bag. There are always quite a few hits and an equal number of misses in any form of governance. Similarly the voters or the beneficiaries also do not get everything right all the time and they experience the mixed assemblage of good and bad governance as they vote this or that party to power. India’s tryst with democracy runs true to the above observation.

 With open eyes, the nation had welcomed Pt. Nehru as the first prime minister and gave him two more consecutive chances that gave him an unstinted period of Prime Ministership for 13 years. He did not complete  the last two years of his third 5-year term because of  his sudden demise. In spite of his success at many levels both within and outside of the nation, he died a broken man with the Chinese betraying the trust he had reposed in them. Lal Bahadur Shastri was Prime MInister for less than two years. Mrs. Gandhi, like her father, had her share of three terms between 1966 and 1984, though it was aborted between 1977-80  for three years as a consequence of her declaration of emergency. Her last innings from 1980 was cut short in 1984 by her assassination, giving her the reigns of the country for a total number of 15 years. Rajiv Gandhi, Narasimha Rao, Atal Behari Vajpayee and ManMohan Singh had five years tenure, though the last mentioned had two five year terms. Three others had very brief stints, of not much import. Now it is the first term of Narendra Modi and soon he will be seeking a second term.

I am not attempting any thesis on political history of post-independence Prime Ministers. The only point of my submission is they all had their share of plusses and minuses in their political reign. It had always been a good and not so good a tenure and seldom did it reach the bottom of turning bad or ugly. If Nehru brought stability after the partition massacre and modernized India, strengthened its infrastructure, ushered in green revolution and white revolution and set up  higher education portals like IITs and IIMs, his failure was due to his honest and deep trust of the Chinese who betrayed it and his socialist phobia. Shastriji gave India a boost with his clinching victory over Pakistan, a clear shot in the arm after the defeat of the Indian forces by China. Within a short period, he boosted both the agricultural and the defence sectors living true to his slogan Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan. Indira continued her father’s liberal and catholic outlook and lifted the morale of India by winning a decisive war against Pakistan and gave Bangladesh its independence from the oppressive and autocratic rule of Pakistan. The telecom revolution ushered by  Rajiv Gandhi, the economic liberalization of Narasimha Rao (that continued under Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh), the rise in GDP growth and pragmatism of Indian foreign policy of Atal Behari Vajpayee and  Manmohan Singh’s Right to Information, Right to Education , Aadhar identification document , and putting the aam admi at the centre of the political economy development- all show  how India’s progress as a modern welfare state had been effectively served by all the Prime ministers though the present government denies giving credit to their contribution. No doubt, the collapse of Panchsheel concept, the sudden death of Shastri, the emergency declaration of Mrs Gandhi, the Bofors scam under Rajeev Gandhi, the fall of Babri Masjid during Rao’s tenure, the uneventful and pedestrian governance under Vajpayee that had no  impact on the common people either positively or negatively ,  the disunity among the BJP leaders in the aftermath of Gujarat riots and the scams that rocked Manmohan Singh’s tenure were the negative factors during the period from 1947-2014.

What has happened in the last four years is the total discrediting of all the earlier achievements in order to show that the new government under Modi(-it is not even referred to as NDA government, but Modi government)alone has been working to develop the country. Unfortunately quite a few ingenious masterstrokes as claimed by Prime Minister as his singular contribution have tumbled like bubble bursts. One is reminded of Mark Antony’s speech which with a little adaptation can well suit the present Prime Minister’s oratory:

Friends, Indians, countrymen, lend me your ears;

I come to bury all the mis-governance of yester years.

The evil that PMs did lives after them;

The good is oft interred with their bones;

So let it be with the PMs of the past.

The scams that clouded their reign

Bofors,2G, Coal et al have shown my predecessors’ fault,

And grievously hath their Congress paid for it.

Here, under leave of Manmohanji  and the rest–

For Manmohanji is an honourable man;

So are they all, all honourable men–

Come I to speak at Congress’ funeral.

And ensure a Congress mukht Bharat

So was Advaniji  my friend, mentor and guide

But I say he was ambitious;

And Advaniji is an honourable man.

He did bring  BJP to power in 1999

But Atalji and not Advaniji ended as Prime Minister.

Advaniji was desperate to be the Prime Minister

Did this in Advaniji seem ambitious?

When Gujarat burnt, Atalji wept:

A PM should be made of sterner stuff:

Advaniji then held my mask to save me

And sought in turn my help to be Atalji’s successor

Was Advaniji  ambitious?

No, he is  an honourable man.

.

I speak not to disprove what Advaniji spoke

To be the next PM,

But here I am to speak what I do know.

You all did love him once, not without cause:

What cause withholds you now not to accept him as the leader?

O judgment! thou art fled to Indian hearts

And they have found their reason in my macho image

To trust me to be their PM.

My heart is still with Advaniji

He is our Marg Darshak

And I must pause to seek my mentor’s blessings.

    I now turn to the opposition which is baying for Modi Mukht Bharat. Both the ruling and the opposition   party have chosen their single respective goal as freeing Bharat from Congress or Modi. It is time the opposition stops sniping at the PM for anything and everything. The twitter is being used only to lambast the PM as with its 140 or a little more word count, there is no space to list out the causes. Twitter is only to simply shoot and scoot. It is time for the opposition to follow PM Modi to remain silent even when thunder and lightning strike and only open up at the right moment to pour vitriol when it is needed to poison the electorate against the opposition.   Congress and in particular Rahul Gandhi should not go ballistic against one man who is the PM of the country. One can question the government’s policies for their merits and demerits, but not go for personal vilification even under the gravest provocation. Modi Government has continued many of the previous governments’ policies and improved on them like construction of roads, electrification of villages, retaining Aadhar and above all ensured  a corruption free government at the top level. The Congress and the opposition should acknowledge the plusses of the Modi Government even when they see its failures in not arresting social disharmony, its failed Kashmir policy, its flip flop policy against Pakistan etc. Let Congress and its allies focus on spelling out their practicable policies instead of critical remarks all the time against Modi Government. Let them list out an alternate Kashmir policy, a new foreign policy in the wake of US belligerence and China’s cunning, a sound agricultural policy to give the farmers  a real  incentive, a visionary policy to synthesize development with environmental safety, a pro active policy to meet the growing water crisis, and an intelligent educational policy that makes education horizontally expansive and vertically progressive,  a far sighted policy to bring a resurgent India that believes in the concept of Many in one, one in Many and other policies that have a direct impact on the well being of all sections of society.

     India is a vast country, a conglomeration of many heterogeneous people of diverse cultures, diverse castes and religions, speaking a variety of languages. It is difficult to govern this nation as it demands catering to different classes and different segments whose needs and requirements are varied and often  incompatible with those of the rest. Every government including the present has made efforts to provide decent governance. It is not all plus or all minus, but a mix of plus and minus. The electorate decides whether plus outweighs minus or the other way around. Time for all the parties to stop whining, complaining and fault finding; time to strategize for the rise of India as conceived and aspired to by Gandhi, Nehru, Patel and millions of honest freedom fathers whose gift of an independent nation is today our proud heritage.