The man & the myth
Piecing together Modi mystique
Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi is the most talented politician of our time and the most enigmatic.
Most talented because he has been able to create for himself an appeal that goes beyond his state and his caste. Of no other regional politician can we say that s/he has a national following based purely on achievement and image.
Modi is today a pan-India figure, loved and admired by millions and feared and disliked by not a few others. He is without question the most important nonCongress leader today. This is remarkable for a man unknown before he was parachuted to the job of chief minister in 2001 of a mediumsized state (Gujarat is about five per cent of India’s population).
And he is enigmatic because despite his enormous success not much is known about Modi. This has partly to do with the secretiveness of the man. He keeps his past away from the enquiries of those he views with suspicion. And partly it has to do with the fact that nobody has really attempted to biograph him properly. There was a hagiography a few years ago, co-authored by former journalist M.V. Kamath, but nothing serious.
Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay corrects this and has done a first-rate job in his book, Narendra Modi: The Man. The Times. It began with Modi’s approval and this gave Mukhopadhyay access to the chief minister. This does not appear to have lasted but while it did, Mukhopadhyay interviewed Modi at length and got some very good material. Modi is uncomfortable with neutrality and that possibly explains why the access ended.
Mukhopadhyay’s reading of the important texts, whether papers on Gujarat’s development or scholarly volumes on the state or work by journalists is thorough and nicely woven into his writing.
As a reporter and writer, Mukhopadhyay is familiar with the background to the ascent of Modi and a lot of this book is devoted to giving us this background. Parts of the book depart from the theme of biography and scan the history of the period. The politics of the Bharatiya Janata Party nationally, and its amazing rise to power on the back of the Babri Masjid issue is crucial to any understanding of Modi. He managed the logistics of L .K . Advani’s seminal
Ra t h Yatra and Murli Manohar Joshi’s less successful Ekta Yatra. His work with the BJP came through the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which he had joined almost as a child.
“He liked their discipline and the line of authority... He was always greatly impressed by the fact that only one person gave all the orders in the Shakha and everyone followed the command,” Modi’s brother Somabhai is quoted as saying in the book.
The RSS deputed Modi to the BJP, where in the 1980s and 1990s he used the opportunity better than any other RSS man has since. He worked hard and efficiently and had a large role in the party’s capture of Gujarat after the Babri Masjid’s demolition. Mukhopadhyay shows us how Modi influenced things even when he was not in office, and what his role was in the internal squabbles that led to an unstable government which continued to get the popular vote but was disorganised.
In 2001, after Keshubhai Patel was despatched for a second time, Atal Behari Vajpayee ordered Modi to Gujarat as chief minister and the book gives us details of how this happened. From there to the Godhra incident and the riots, and the rise of Modi as a national figure is a story we are all familiar with, and Mukhopadhyay goes over the story’s details expertly.
One aspect of Modi which is fascinating is how he, someone with no experience of administration, has been able to stamp his authority on a bureaucracy that is fixed in the manner of its working.
Mukhopadhyay asks Modi how he did this. Modi says this is because he applies himself independently to issues and asks why things cannot work in the way that he has simplified them. He gives the example of providing 24-hours electricity to homes: “I asked my officers where was the problem? I used to be told that there is a lot of power theft... that there is not enough power generation. So I asked them why don’t you segregate the feeders — let one go to the villages for the homes and another for the agricultural fields.” Modi says the officers laughed when he said this, but it worked so well that “we are getting kudos from the entire country because of this”. Another thing that will fascinate readers is the relationship Modi has built with industry. At first, given the liberal education of most of India’s business community, Modi was not popular with them. However, his efforts to reach out to them without compromising or apologising for his Hindutva ideology paid off. Today, he is the most popular leader so far as they are con - cerned, in our most industry-friendly state.
Some of this, as Mukhopadhyay shows, may well be because of handouts from the state. However, it cannot be denied that Modi has worked consistently to isolate his governance and its economic aspects from controversy and kept it sharp and focused on growth.
Along with the political and administrative aspects to Modi’s success, the book offers some good reading on Modi’s personal side, too.
There is a delightful chapter in which we are given details of the famous shortsleeved Modi kurta and its evolution. Modi has them stitched at an upmarket tailor called Jade Blue in Ahmedabad. Even as a child “he liked to dress properly and took care of his clothes — did not allow them to get frayed and ruffled like other children. He spent a lot of time grooming”. There is plenty of other such material that puts flesh on the character of Modi.
Mukhopadhyay is always respectful in the way he approaches his subject, though it is made quite clear to us that he is appalled and dismayed by the events of 2002.
This splendid and thorough book offers much to those who wish to understand Modi, whether they are attracted to or repelled by him. Aakar Patel is a writer
and columnist