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Lousy economics & lousier politics: Modi govt acting like any other panicky last-year govt

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A series of bypoll losses has pushed the Modi government into panic mode. Uncharacteristically, it’s letting events dictate its actions.

Throwing good money after bad money is an old truism. But throwing good money after bad politics? Every government does it, in its last year. But is Narendra Modi’s also behaving like “any other” government? With butterflies in the stomach?

Let’s not judge, just look at the facts. Earlier this week, the government announced a Rs 7,000-crore package for the sugar/sugarcane industry. Will it solve the problem, or even postpone it? Absolutely not.

The problem with sugar is, there is way too much of it, in the world, as in India. If the mills pay the nutty Minimum Support Price mandated by the “pro-farmer” government, they simply cannot recover their costs. If the government wants to maintain “more remunerative” prices, it has to ban imports, which it does. And yet, if the prices remain unremunerative (for the mills), you fix an MRP. It is one of those licence-control raj absurdities: Thou shall not sell sugar below this. The retail price will now be “controlled”. About 80 per cent of the voters in 2019, will have no idea of this lousy, back-to-sixties economics. And lousier politics. Here’s why.

Shekhar Gupta, chairman and editor-in-chief of ThePrintToo many Indian farmers are growing too much sugar. People can’t consume it unless you declare jalebis and gulab jamuns mandatory with each meal. At today’s global prices, you can’t export it. This money will go down the drain with molasses. However, you could have used it to incentivise tens of thousands of farmers to move away from cane, especially in water-short Maharashtra whose sugarcane addiction is an environmental disaster. The same farmers would do enormously better with growing fruit. Spending even Rs 20,000 crore on that change would be investing good money after good economics and better politics. But you cannot see the gains before May 2019. Now, you are guaranteed to leave everybody unhappy and asking for more. So go ahead, and feed the glut.

Let’s not get distracted by flawed agricultural economics and stay with politics. This cane capitulation came within a week of the bypoll loss in Kairana, Uttar Pradesh’s cane or ganna heartland. You figured the angry farmers who voted for you in 2014 had now rejected you, making common cause with the Muslims they had rioted with. The farmers are angry enough to forget polarisation. In fact, you were made to pay for the imprudence of Yogi Adityanath invoking the long dead-and-gone founder of Pakistan in his election campaign to bring back the only trick he knows: Polarisation. It just so happens that Jinnah rhymes with ganna and you gifted your rivals a devastating slogan.

Check out some other facts, on the political side. The panic with which it has moved to mend fences with allies. Just the day after the Kairana loss, it conceded a demand of the Shiromani Akali Dal it had long denied, of waiving GST on the ingredients bought for the langar at gurdwaras.

The fraught relationship between Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and BJP president Amit Shah is well-known. Now, in the same week as the sugar and langar give-aways, Shah landed at Uddhav’s home, his hand-picked chief minister in tow. Being his father’s son, Uddhav didn’t miss the opportunity to make a political point. He made the chief minister, who leads the state government in which Sena is the junior partner, wait outside. Why would you take such humiliation?

Four years back, the BJP came to power with a full majority, not needing any partners. It still professed coalition dharma but everybody bowed to a prime minister with power and popularity unprecedented in a generation. That’s why Nitish Kumar, that compulsive and precise weathervane, dumped the secular platform for an anti-corruption one and defected to the NDA. Now, he dares to talk of a local NDA within the NDA in Bihar. Upendra Kushwaha, who leads a tiny Bihar party, RLSP, with three MPs, is also giving a warning by missing the formal NDA dinner in Patna. The message: You look weak despite your majority. Expect us to bargain harder.

Kairana is the latest trigger but the Modi government’s political momentum was broken earlier, in the same state. The loss of both, Uttar Pradesh chief minister and his deputy’s pocket boroughs, Gorakhpur and Phulpur in bye-elections brought to the BJP its first intimations of vulnerability. It has made more panicky errors since. One of its main planks in 2014 was a war on corruption. Its fearfully desperate embrace of the Ballari brothers with their mob back in Karnataka has ended that.

The fact is, Modi was still quite popular in Karnataka and may have swung a majority by himself. But the Ballari brothers put doubts in the voters’ minds. Evidence: They won only three of the nine seats in the district they were expected to sweep. And the BJP lost its anti-corruption plank for 2019. You cannot have the CBI suddenly discover before the Karnataka elections that there is no evidence against the Reddys of Ballari in illegal mining/iron ore export cases. You can revel in electoral engineering. You can also over-engineer yourself into trouble.

The BJP appointed an agriculture minister not particularly for his intellect, or even native instinct. For four years, the farm sector has grown at about half the rate compared to UPA’s 10 years. And remember even then, at 3.7 per cent average annual growth, there was farmer distress. Your man has meanwhile delivered: A new organic manure drawn from the good bacteria found only in the dung of the desi cow, our most pujyaniya collective “maata”. This isn’t a joke. The agriculture ministry is marketing this at a token price. You buy a small bottle, and pour it in a pond of organic garbage. I bet it makes wonderful manure, but doubt if it will double farmers’ income by 2022. Sugar is not a new crisis. It’s been building all these last four years, but who had the time.

The second is its arrogant choice of lightweight new chief ministers, each of whom is a liability now. The three who won you nearly all the seats in their states, are the ones who feel ignored, punch-drunk and sneered at. The third is the price it is paying for treating allies with arrogance. We know that this generation of politicians lack the experience of ruling with a full majority. The BJP needed to take a deep, humble breath and accept a basic fact, the reason people join politics: A share in the spoils of power. The allies were given nothing ministries. The Akalis are the BJP’s most loyal allies, and its ruling family’s daughter-in-law is their only member in the cabinet with the charge of food processing. In her home state, she is derided as “chutney-achar-jam-murabba” minister. Do you remember Shiv Sainik Anant Geete’s portfolio? No ally has been able to gift a governorship for its own faithful. BJP has run a coalition government but with winner-takes-all rules. No surprise now it is letting events dictate its actions, like any other nervy incumbent, rather than be its usual, all-conquering cavalry, set for another big conquest.

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11 COMMENTS

  1. The Problem is with isms and the dogma it develops in its wake. As long as there is enforced normativity there is going to be an issue.

  2. After a slap in face, there is shot in the foot. Forget Modi haters, what is really disconcerting to any Modi supporter is that after this sugarcane debacle, BJP has really proven to be a party of mean urbanites with no clue what agriculture is all about and think farmer is a spoilt guy who is having loads of free fun on huge patch of land bigger then the plot they could buy in Sunehri Market. People are raring to throw this man and his party out, but options are only worse.

  3. Prof PK Sharma,Freelance Journalist, Barnala(Punjab)
    Taking a leaf from bitter and bad experiences of coalition governments at the centre book, the masses pinned its high hopes upon BJP led by Mr. Narendra Modi offering it the clear cut mandate for a change for the best in the 2014 !
    However, this optimism only proved to be a silver lining for a brief spell and electorate found its hopes dashed to the ground very soon!
    Why did it happen?
    PM Modi during his poll campaign then created a hype of high hopes among the public to deliver the goods ! But unfortunately, he frittered away this golden opportunity for want of vision, proper planning, seriousness and selection of competent team of ministers and advisors to match the confidence reposed in him by the voters !
    Neither did NaMo impress citizens of India with his brand of politics nor economics during all these four years ! His decisions reflected immaturity aimed at hollow populism not backed by a firm political will to effect positive and constructive innovations and advancements on the national scene !
    For example, demonetisation, farmers distress, shattered economy, poverty,corruption, black money, unemployment, affordable quality education, health care system, foreign policy, insurgency in Kashmir, GST and communal disharmony are the burning and sensitive problems of the day.
    What is the output of these tormenting issues after four years of NaMo government’s input?

    Not learning any lesson from past too many blunders, Modi is not at all keen to strive for immediate course correction measures treading on the same worn out path ! Half a year’s time is not inadequate if you have the will, right intentions and determination
    to translate your ideas into actuality ! But now again instead of taking practical decisions he is making all out efforts only for a
    damage control of humiliations suffered at the time of hustings during the bypolls ultimately eyeing 2019 Lok Sabha Polls !

    All of a sudden, Amit Shah, BJP supremo is now constantly on his toes to rush to Matoshree Mumbai and the very next day to MLAs
    Flats at Chandigarh. It seems quite awkward that Shah had to see Uddhav Thackeray and Parkash Singh Badal to convince about the achievements of NDA government of which they are a part and parcel. Very strange type of campaign- Samparak For Samarthan where BJP Chief is constrained to impress upon NDA allies. The dusty road to impress upon people of nation then must be very rough and tough if allies ought to be placated in this style !

    After a deep and long slumber of four years, BJP is indulging in just melodrama of waking up to the stark and dark realities faced by the nation! Where is the credibility ? Who will believe NaMo when his regime stands miserably exposed ?

    In 2014, residents of India fell a prey to the ploys, false hopes, fallacious and hype-creating guiles of NaMo but now they have seen through his tricks ! They have made up their mind to write a new narrative teaching a lesson to megalomaniac and authoritarian
    rule of NaMo in 2019 !
    Prof PK Sharma,Freelance Journalist
    Pom Anm Nest,Barnala(Punjab)

  4. Two things can be said about 2019. 272 has become Mission Impossible. And each CM will have to deliver. Far too many of them – like their colleagues at the Centre – are simply not up to the mark. Mrs Gandhi started the system of bonsai CMs because she could reach out directly to the people, all over the country, and win elections. That contributed to the long term decline of the Congress party. Too late for one, too difficult for the other, but it would improve the BJP’s chances in 2019 if it replaced its CMs in Haryana and UP.

  5. I find it logical, I also see a contradiction.
    If there is so much abundance, why govt. has to import sugar?

  6. Agrarian crisis can only be solved in the long run, not in the four years. First of all, we need to move to produce as per market demand. But MSP business, the loan waivers etc are not helping it. Modi government also faced two successive droughts. All farmers agitation are politically instigated as their problems are not very new. BJP allies if feel very clever and demand too much, they will sink too. As they are all vulnerable in their states. In the election year, BJP is to give the good perception to everyone to shut opposition off. Now it is not the time to solve long-term problems. These can be solved in next tenure. Only very small percentage of people understand how things can be solved and what has to be discontinued for the long-term good.

  7. no question modi’s underperforming gimmick prone ministers from irani to agriculture etc. But modi appointed them, he should pay the electoral price for their failures.

  8. Its absolutely true Shekharji. Polarization will never happen again as it happened in 2014. We may even see a hung parliament and dilly dallying/horsetrading et al in the aftermath of the people’s verdict. Lets see what happens in 2019. Anyway, we are in for a humdinger of an election with the non-NDA parties rallying behind an yet to be announced prime ministerial candidate. The honorable Shashi Tharoor, MP is a charismatic leader, behind whom we Indians must stand firm. He is the most suited person to lead our country forward at this crucial juncture.

    • With due respect to Mr. Tharoor (he’s my favourite Malayali person), his reputation is sadly tainted by the Sunanda Pushkar case. Although he will be eventually found innocent, that may take years to materialize.

      A Congress-led UPA or a Third-front led UPA would require a non-tainted person for the top post, someone like Manmohan Singh who sadly cannot make a comeback. Someone young and eloquent in English like Shashi Tharoor would be a good candidate, to help bring much-needed foreign investment into India. Sadly you can’t have always have what you want.

      Rahul Gandhi is not an ambitious person. Even though he’s face of the Congress party, he is content being Party president. He is guaranteed to step aside for a more deserving candidate. Also he’s not in the league of someone qualified like Manmohan Singh, a fact he himself admits to. But I know for sure Rahul is not a greedy person.

      I have a feeling that UPA might go for a Dalit Prime Minister this time, someone like Mayawati who is on good terms with Sonia Gandhi. Do not underestimate her even though many upper caste Indians harbor prejudice against her. The fact that India has elected a Dalit woman as Prime Minister will be seen as a very progressive move in the Western countries which often chastise India because of centuries old practices such as untouchability.

      After 5 years of Modi era fascism, it will be a welcome change to have progressive politics in India from 2019 onwards.

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