Carpe diem

In his first public speech after leading the BJP to a historic win, Narendra Modi was careful to strike precisely the right note with not only those who voted for him, but those who did not. The country’s next Prime Minister promised his government will work for “all Indians” and spoke of his vision of inclusive development. “There is only one medicine for all the problems of our nation,” he said, “and that medicine is development.” Political opponents have in the past often criticised Modi for his allegedly nebulous grasp of history. But no one can fault his ability to sense when history is in the making — and seize the moment. But history does have its uses — particularly in helping us avoid the mistakes of the past. History tells us that India had another Prime Minister with a massive majority in Parliament. In 1984, Rajiv Gandhi was elected to office with the largest mandate in India’s history — 411 seats in a 542-seat House. Rajiv Gandhi too had shared a vision of development, of technology and the aspirations of India’s then-emergent middle class. As contemporary historians have argued, Rajiv Gandhi needs to be assessed, not just in the context of his successes, but also in the context of his failures — his failure to reform India’s social laws after the Shah Bano verdict, his failures on Ayodhya and Kashmir, and, indeed, his failure to counter VP Singh and the subsequent ‘Mandalisation’ of Indian politics.

Clearly, having the right prescription is not enough to make one a good doctor. One must also have the ability to administer the right medicine — even if it is bitter — for the benefit of the patient. The first priority for Modi’s government should be governance itself. In order to break the insidious “policy paralysis” which has stalled decision-making and slowed growth over the past few years, he needs to get the process of decision-making going again. This would need not only clear policy vision, but also the empowering of all arms of the government, especially the bureaucracy, to take decisions in a quick, efficient and transparent manner, without the fear, under which even upright officials now labour, that such decisions will come back to haunt them. We need to move from goals to outcomes. It is all very well to legislate entitlements, but they will be meaningless without delivery. We already have a Right to Food and a Right to Education, for example, though large segments of the population can access neither.

Modi starts with some advantages. An agreement on the Goods and Services Tax is almost there, the first industrial corridor is ‘shovel ready’, and the framework of a new Direct Taxes Code has already been worked out. What is needed now is quick implementation on these fronts, as well as decisive actions to undo some of the mistakes of the past, from retrospective tax amendments to the BJP’s own backpedalling on FDI in retail, or the unworkable Land Acquisition Act. Tough decisions on subsidies and energy prices will also have to be taken, and domestic investors will have to be reassured that the ‘country risk’ for investing in India is minimised. The markets already think that Modi will deliver on these fronts. It is time to live up to those expectations.

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