Wide gap between Modi speeches and performance, says Tharoor

Congress leader Shashi Tharoor today slammed the Narendra Modi government saying "it's too early to see results but there seems to be a gulf between the actual performance and the speeches made".
"I don't want to cast judgement yet because it's only been six months. But I think there seems to be a bit of a gulf between the action and the implementation of the words we are hearing in the speeches and the actual performance on the ground," Tharoor told reporters here.
The former union minister was one of the main speakers at a seminar "Driving Excellence through Creativity" organised at the INFOCOM, a platform on the convergence of Business, Technology and Leadership elements.

Questioning the reflection of Modi's promises of "minimum government, maximum governance" made during the Lok Sabha poll campaigning in his work, the MP from Thiruvanathapuram said, "We see that sometimes sound bytes are given for the sake of giving them. Where is minimum government ...We are actually seeing tremendous consolidation of power in one power's hand. It's a sort of one person rule. Ministers have been bypassed, the Prime Minister is working directly through secretaries."
"We are seeing, for example, the so called lean and mean cabinet (has been) expanded to 66 out of maximum permissible level... There is no real concrete examples of minimum government... It is maximum government in power in the hands of the Prime Minister. So that's the slogan we should not corresponding to the actual practice," he said.

He further questioned Modi's slogan of having no business to be in business.

"Which government businesses are being dismantled? If Modi genuinely believes that, then why is the government running an airline, hotels ? Those are private businesses everyone runs," he added.
"There is apparently no connection between the nice sounding soundbytes and the actual policy actions of the government that should follow to fulfil those sound bytes. If this keeps on happening then we will develop a little bit of scepticism," he quipped.
"But, as I say that I do not want to come to a permanent conclusion on the basis of six months but I do worry that if it keeps on being the pattern then we all have the cause to be anxious," Tharoor said.