Transforming India

The Modi government has been accused in the past of being big on slogans, but not so big on delivery. While slogans do play an important role in conveying a message to the masses, there is a risk of rhetoric overwhelming reality. This is why Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Independence Day speech came as a refreshing departure from the past. While Modi’s wonted oratorial skills were very much in evidence, the thrust of the speech was less about slogans and more about implementation. This focus on outcomes rather than intentions is welcome. Indeed, outcomes should be the focus of this, or any government. If at all another slogan is needed, it should be ‘Implementation, Implementation, Implementation’. For, this administration, more than any that preceded it, will be judged on its implementation record.

There is no denying that the National Democratic Alliance government has speeded up implementation of projects, acted on prices and on the whole taken forward the reforms process set in motion by the preceding governments. More notably, Modi has not only embraced some of the previous government’s schemes such as Aadhaar and the Mahatama Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, as well as direct transfer of benefits and subsidies, but brought his wonted powers of execution to bear on them, ensuring that what had, with the exception of MNREGS, largely remained merely good ideas were transformed into actions that benefit the poor. Incidentally, some of these projects had been criticised by Modi in the run up to the May 2014 general elections. The fact that not only were these schemes not scrapped, but pursued with vigour, signals a growing maturity in our polity. Reforms are a continuous process, which need some course correction every few years, particularly with changes in economic environment and social circumstances. As the Prime Minister correctly stated in his speech from Red Fort to mark the 70th anniversary of India’s independence, all policies should aim to serve the national interest. And so, it is in the national interest for an incoming government to carry forward a previous government’s scheme after rectifying shortcomings in the scheme.

Over the past two years that it has been in office at the Centre, the NDA government has time and again demonstrated this ability to seize a good idea and implement it fully. It took diesel price deregulation, that had begun during the UPA’s term, to its logical conclusion. Further, the learnings from diesel price deregulation are now being leveraged to reduce the subsidy bill on both kerosene and liquefied petroleum gas. . The transformative Jan Dhan Yojana, which has provided access to financial services to millions of poor, or leveraging the potential of Aadhaar, or even getting the better off to surrender LPG subsidy voluntarily and use the money so saved to provide LPG connections to poor rural households, and finally getting the GST Bill moving, are all signal achievements.. The challenge before Modi now is to deliver on his latest slogan: “Reform, perform, transform.”

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