Why Modi continues to win

OF LATE I have begun to get seriously worried every time the BJP wins yet another election in Narendra Modi’s name. If using the Prime Minister as symbol, slogan and campaign mascot in Uttar Pradesh was understandable, it was absurd that the same formula was used for municipal elections in Delhi. It helped of course that Arvind Kejriwal was foolish enough to threaten voters that their children would suffer from dengue fever and chikungunya if they did not vote for him. But if the BJP managed to win despite a decade of lousy municipal services, it was because of the exceptional faith Indian voters appear to have in Modi. So what is his secret? Is there a secret? Or is it just that in the past three years there has been a total failure of imagination on the part of his combined opposition?

Personally, I believe this to be the case. Every time a new electoral defeat happens, venerable opposition leaders say exactly the same thing they have been saying since the Modi era began. They announce that they have to ‘come together’ by 2019 to defeat the ‘forces of communalism, fascism and Hindutva’. Can they think of nothing newer than this dated war cry?

And why do our opposition leaders always seem to find the wrong issue? A recent example came when veteran Congress leaders toddled off to Rashtrapati Bhavan (yet again!!) to complain, this time about EVM machines. This particular complaint was almost more absurd than any other they have taken to the President. Did they not notice that these same machines delivered them a clear victory in Punjab?

What is even more puzzling is why supposedly ‘secular’ opposition leaders have made almost no fuss over the killings by cow vigilantes in the past year. Surely the lynching of Pehlu Khan would have been an issue that was worthy of not just a march to Rashtrapati Bhavan but a major protest movement, but all we have heard from our ‘secular’ parties are murmurs of disapproval. And this despite some excellent journalism by India Today reporters who revealed from talking to cow vigilantes that their real motive is to break every bone in the body of Muslim cattle traders.

It sickened me to watch these men boast about how they made sure that there were no external injuries on their victims because if there was bleeding then there could be trouble with the police. So what they did instead was to beat them so badly that internal injuries would cripple them for the rest of their lives. In the words of one boastful vigilante, “We make sure that we beat them in a way that ensures that they never manage to walk again.”

Is this not something that our ‘secular’ opposition leaders should be using to force the Prime Minister to openly condemn vigilantism that is really just a garb for destroying the lives and livelihoods of some of the poorest Muslim communities in India?

He has done this once before, but needs to do it again urgently, and probably would if opposition leaders made vigilante violence the national issue it deserves to be. Why do opposition leaders who wear their ‘secularism’ on the sleeves of their khadi kurtas not concentrate their energies on reminding the Prime Minister that despite his slogan of ‘sabka saath, sabka vikas’, this is simply not happening in practice? Why do they not remind him that in his reign has flourished a particularly nasty breed of Hindutva hoodlums whose violence has reached alarming levels?

If Modi continues to be a brand that Indian voters buy, it is because he seems very different to the kind of political leaders they have so far been used to. He does not have a family that is benefiting financially from his office. He does not lead a political party that is in fact a family business to be handed down to some heir. And his message remains mostly positive. He may not have achieved all the goals of Swachh Bharat but nobody can fault him for not trying his best. He may not have yet brought prosperity to the vast majority of Indians but he cannot be faulted for not trying. He may not have made India more secure against jihadist terrorism and Naxalite violence but nobody can accuse of him of not making national security a priority.

On the other side stand opposition leaders who have not come up with anything resembling a new idea in decades. If this were not bad enough, their political message is wholly negative. It consists of personal attacks on the Prime Minister that are often bizarre beyond belief. When mighty opposition leaders accused Modi of using demonetisation to steal money from the poor to give his rich friends, not even the most gullible voter was fooled.

Follow Tavleen Singh on Twitter @ tavleen_singh