One out of four is not a good score

Govts are judged on the basis its politics, economics, foreign policy, and social policies

The Modi government completed three years in office in May this year. The customary assessments followed. They were all made in the aftermath of the BJP’s massive win in UP.

In the afterglow of that victory the previous three years were seen as being successful. Otherwise, went the argument, why would the BJP have won so handsomely? 

But we forget that all governments everywhere are judged on the basis of four broad categories. These are its politics, its economics, its foreign policy, and its social policies.

Within this, there are two other categories: The small initiatives that all governments undertake to clean up governance and administration and the big initiatives they undertake to alter the prevailing paradigms.

The Modi government has not been an exception to this general rule. It keeps talking about how it has improved the administrative and governance systems.

This is probably true because Mr Modi has untiringly focused on improving public administration and some of that effort is bound to be paying off. But the success of small initiatives is only one side of the coin.

The other side is the bigger initiatives. These have been terrible in three of the four categories mentioned above: Politics, economy, foreign policy, and social policies. 

It is only in politics that Mr Modi has been outstandingly successful. This is because he is absolutely determined to get his party re-elected in 2019. But that, given the weak opposition, is the easy part. 

The hard part is to once again win an absolute majority. The BJP has to lose only 11 seats in the next Lok Sabha for it to lose its pre-eminence.

And on current reckoning, that seems a certainty. 

Triple snafu

If, to use Jean Dreze’s accurate description, demonetisation shot out the front tyres of the economy, the way the goods and services tax (GST) has been designed and implemented is letting out the air slowly from the rear tyres. If the former knocked out demand, the latter has knocked out supply.

The result can be seen in the general deflation. Jobs, wages, prices, and foreign trade, all four are down and out.

Mr Modi, even if he can blame the states for the GST mess, has no one but himself to blame for demonetisation. It was wholly unnecessary and has become wholly counterproductive.

A similar outcome can be seen in foreign policy also. A foreign policy is good when a country is getting along well, primarily with its neighbours, and secondarily with the large countries.

By this yardstick, Mr Modi has failed spectacularly. China is almost threatening war and Pakistan has never been bolder in Kashmir than now. Both smell a huge opportunity to dismember India.

The US, meanwhile, despite massive orders for its producers, is not reciprocating in any meaningful way. Russia is irritated and Europe has made itself irrelevant. Japan is neither here nor there.

Finally, there are the social policies of this government. They are making people feel unsafe and uncomfortable. There is aggression in the air everywhere, which is sparing no one. Who will be lynched next? 

True, this happens when the economy does badly. But the exaggerated emphasis on a peculiar brand of nationalism also has also had the same effect. That is the atmosphere which this government, unintentionally perhaps, has succeeded in creating.

Desh Seva is all very well. But can it come at the cost of Jan Seva? 

Intellect and attitude

Mr Modi is still very popular. That is not such a bad thing, as the lumpen intelligentsia would have us believe.

Countries need popular leaders even if they have severe limitations of intellect and attitude. Only Jawaharlal Nehru scores well on both counts.

The rest of our prime ministers failed comprehensively on one of the two counts. Some failed on both.

But from all accounts, Mr Modi appears to have a third negative attribute as well. Although he hears everyone out, he seems to listen to very few and often the wrong ones.

Therefore, he ends up making avoidable mistakes, some of them enormous. If it’s not this failing, it’s his tendency to decide before fully working out the non-political implications. Remember that Christmas visit to Pakistan?

That is why the big question now is whether, in the next six months, Mr Modi can take corrective action so that his popularity rests on firmer grounds than just a lot of oratorical promises at the individual and collective levels.

Otherwise, the current weak political pushback could become a very strong one and cost the BJP its majority.