Posted on: 20-06-06 16:21:46
Narendra Modi Zindabad !
WOW! Gujarat - Israel Friendship !
http://in.rediff.com/news/2006/jun/20modi.htm
Modi's mantra: Gujarat first
June 20, 2006
Chief Minister Narendra Modi will use any trick in the book to get Gujarat its due.
Modi accompanied Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar to Israel last week -- possibly the only foreign country that will host him now, after the 2002 Gujarat riots. Modi managed to establish an impossible connection between India and Israel -- that of water. \"You are a desert and so are we. So we have the same sorts of problems, whether in the field of agriculture or food,\" he said. The Israelis were ecstatic, the Gujarat government would have us believe.
To Modi's critics -- and there are lots and lots -- Israel's endorsement of Modi cannot come as a surprise. Israel is a military industrial state, pogroms, anti-Muslim; Modi is… (geddit? geddit?!). But for those of us who are uncomfortable with labels like pseudo-secular, communal, secularist, and so on, it is galling to admit that Modi represents a challenge. He needs to be deconstructed to be understood fully in context.
First, his administrative record is excellent. His critics in the Gujarat unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party may say that Gujarat has got investments only worth Rs 500 crore and that his claims that Rs 70,000 crore had been invested in the state since he came to power is rubbish. You could also say that phrases like economic freedom for which the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Contemporary Studies ranked Gujarat among India's best administered states, mean little for an entrepreneurial state like Gujarat and had nothing to do with Modi in any case.
But on some counts you have to give Modi credit. One, based on anecdotal evidence it would seem corruption has come down significantly in the state. The way an industrialist tells it, he paid a minister in the Gujarat government and Modi came to know of it. He asked if bribes had been paid. The industrialist first demurred and then, greed getting the better of him, admitted (possibly in the hope he would get his money back) that he'd paid Rs 10 lakh. Modi telephoned the minister, informed him that the industrialist was sitting with him and asked when the Rs 10 lakh was being deposited with the party. This was the clearest message to investors -- if there was to be any corruption, Modi had to know about it.
Second, Modi is unequivocally, totally, passionately devoted to Gujarat. During the recent Narmada Dam controversy, Union Water Resources Minister Saifuddin Soz who was appalled at the way rehabilitation was handled by Madhya Pradesh, tried to stall Gujarat from raising the height of the dam so that he could secure some kind of deal for the oustees.
Modi came to Delhi for secret talks with Soz where Soz virtually begged him to postpone the decision. \"I will issue a public statement saying you are India's greatest statesman,\" Soz told Modi, possibly expecting that an endorsement from a Kashmiri Muslim would help Modi wash away some of the Godhra black.
The only statement I want, Modi told Soz, is from the people of Gujarat. He then returned to Ahmedabad, made public the fact that Delhi wanted him to cut a deal that he refused and challenged the Gujarat Congress to tell the state where it stood -- with the UPA at the Centre or with Gujarat? MPs and political leaders from the state cutting across party lines rushed to Delhi to tell the prime minister not to punish Gujarat for it had committed no fault. It was Modi's initiative all the way.
You could argue that this is politics and that it has nothing to do with administration, but there is a direct link between the two. In Gujarat, historically, Hindu mass organisations such as the Rashtriya Swyamsevak Sangh and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad have had a base that has deepened after the decline of Ahmedabad's textile industry. Having been a pracharak in the RSS, Modi is intimately acquainted with the politics, ambitions and goals of all three.
If there is such a strong, communally polarised populace in Gujarat, who do you reckon they would vote for — Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Pravin Togadia, a Gujarati, or Gujarat leader Narendra Modi?
Conscious that voters have a choice, Togadia and Modi have tried to steer clear of each other's path. The Trishul movement launched by the VHP found resonance in Rajasthan, not in Gujarat (although recognising the dangers, the Rajasthan government had Togadia arrested and jailed).
Modi is more than familiar with the lifestyle of VHP leaders and how it is supported. There was a time during previous BJP regimes that the Gujarat government used to pay VHP workers' salaries. No longer. Modi tells his colleagues clearly that if industry is to be brought to heel, he will do it -- he doesn't need the VHP's help.
The VHP had to vent its frustration very publicly recently when after L K Advani's remarks about Jinnah, it undertook a \"shuddhi\" of a road the BJP leader had inaugurated in Gujarat. Modi watched all these contortions quietly and from a distance. By contrast, when he supported anti-Aamir Khan protests, it was over an issue that had at its heart the interests of Gujarat, not Hindutva. Those who know the leader were also surprised when of all the second-generation leaders in the BJP, he emerged as the only one to support Advani during the Jinnah episode. This was because for most of these leaders, the discrediting of Advani by the RSS represented an opportunity. Only Modi was farsighted enough to see it as a threat -- of the RSS exerting more control over the BJP.
When a spokesman of the RSS was unwise enough to hint that Modi was behind the circulation of compromising CDs featuring RSS leader Sanjay Joshi, Modi called intermediaries between the BJP and the Sangh to say he was willing to hand over the whole matter to the Central Bureau of Investigation -- but then that would reveal everything and everyone. The statement was quickly contradicted by BJP President Rajnath Singh.
Modi's position is: Gujarat first, everything else later. He is the only mass leader the BJP has. Paradoxically, this owes to the tension between the branches of the Hindutva family. Logically, this will propel Modi to the presidentship of the BJP. What will happen then is anyone's guess.
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Speech by Thomas Friedman of The New York Times....
"When we were young kids growing up in America, we were told to eat our
vegetables at dinner and not leave them. Mothers said, 'think of the
starving children in India and finish the dinner.' And now I tell my
children: 'Finish your maths homework. Think of the children in India
who would make you starve, if you don't.'"
Very interesting read.
Scary thought though at the end...Modi becoming president of the BJP.
The concept of Narendra Modi becoming the President of BJP is very possible based on the current political situation in India. In India the opposition party gets to power the next time around, as people would like to see a change in the government like they would like to change their curtains/pillow cover. Todays Congress government is two steps forward, three steps backward in its approach. Just look at the nuclear treaty with US of A, gas pipeline with Iran, the reservation issue, its stand on the Tamils in Sri Lanka while supporting the pro-tamil party in power in Tamil Nadu. What are the options available with BJP the people who can make it are Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley, Maneka Gandhi and a few others. The person who can stir up passion is Narendra Modi.
Didn't Harper become the PM of Canada or the same way didn't Bush get into power for two terms ?.When Rahul Gandhi can become the Prime Minister of India, what is wrong for Narendra Modi becoming the President of BJP, more so over the Prime Minister of India. Which state runs the total stock market(s) of India. From which state are the most powerful and fastest growing industrialists in India from?.
The choices available for future Prime Ministership of India are limited and the choices are L.K.Advani, P.Chidambaram, Narendra Modi, Jayalalitha, Chandra Babu Naidu to name a few. Would like to see anybody from the above or Lalu Prasad and Mulayalam Singh become the PM of India ?.
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Speech by Thomas Friedman of The New York Times....
"When we were young kids growing up in America, we were told to eat our
vegetables at dinner and not leave them. Mothers said, 'think of the
starving children in India and finish the dinner.' And now I tell my
children: 'Finish your maths homework. Think of the children in India
who would make you starve, if you don't.'"
I thought the nuclear deal was good for India? What did we lose there?
Comparisons to Bush are not exactly a good thing.
Also, on the progressive state of Gujarat...you forgot the small item of a few thousand people being slaughtered.
I wish people will get their stories straight regarding 'slaughtering' people. You really need both your hands to clap.
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all is well that ends well
1.Still the negotiations are on, but remember there is going to be elections and if the deal is not through then it would be difficult through a potential democratic majority.
2. I do not want to get into the \"Slaughtering\" debate, as I was not there when it happened. But the Government of India has given a clean report on the train incident through the Banerjee report.
3.I can only go by my personal experience when I used to live in one of the tallest building in Ahmedabad then in mid 1990's. Whenever there was a Pakistan - India cricket match, if India won the part of new Karnavati beyond the ellis bridge used to celebrate, while when Pakistan won the older Karnavati used to celebrate bursting cracker. I've been through many parts of the old Karnavati and I used to see Pakistan flag flying in full colors in India.
4. You can look at history the way you want. It all depends on where you want to draw the line. In Karnataka \"Tipu Sultan\" is considered as a hero for fighting the British for Independance. The liqour baron Vijay Mallya even paid millions to reclaim the sword of Tipu Sultan for a musuem in Karnataka. But when you read the history you would find how he had raided many parts of Tamil Nadu, killed many opponents even to the extent of hanging the women and children out of his opponents fort walls. If you study the history of Gengis Khan he is supposed to have killed the men of his opponents and made his warriors to impregnate the women of his opponents so that his clan would multiply. At the same time you would find the actor Feroze Khan has been banned from entering Pakistan for comparing India's secularism with the current situation in Pakistan. Hence if you want to draw the line of history in the last 50 years it would read something, and if you draw the line a few hundreds years ago it would mean something. But at the same time \"Eye for Eye makes the whole world blind\".
5.As I found Canada not suited to my needs and expectations, in place of complaining any more I made a decision to move on. As they say if you find the kitchen too hot to handle, leave the kitchen. Many of my fellow Desis in this CD have been always telling the Boo-Hoo club that if you do not accept Canada for what it is, you are free to seek alternatives.They are exactly right in their words.
6.I'm not comparing Narendra Modi to Bush. As on date 2500 + active duty Americans have been killed for no fault of them. It is the same with Harper, many more Canadians have been killed in Afghanistan for no fault of theirs. I'm just drawing a parallel that men who can stir passion within people win elections.
7.I'm again spinning the top on its head by thanking Harper for reopening the Air - India bombing case today. There is full enquiry on again. What should I call the 330 lives lost in this tragedy at the same time, thousands of innocent lives were lost in New Delhi because of a couple of guys after Indira Gandhi's assasination. The same continues in regards to Rajiv Gandhi's assassination.One wrong does not make another right.
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Speech by Thomas Friedman of The New York Times....
"When we were young kids growing up in America, we were told to eat our
vegetables at dinner and not leave them. Mothers said, 'think of the
starving children in India and finish the dinner.' And now I tell my
children: 'Finish your maths homework. Think of the children in India
who would make you starve, if you don't.'"
I don't know why the "secular" Indians are worried so much over Modi becoming (that is if at all he does) the BJP president. It's not like riots will break out all over India instantly! Even if he becomes the PM, i am sure nothing is going to happen. The dynamics change drastically when you are in charge of the whole country. Remember, a few months back Hamas won the elections in Palestine and all western countries got worked up? well nothing has happened so far.
Modi will never become the BJp president or India's PM. He maybe a fantastic administrator but politics, oops sorry, secular politics will ensure he doens't progress in his career. IF he is made the party president or PM, it will only give the "secular" (in reality the most communal) party, the congress, a chance to raise the "protection of minority" issue. "Secular" champs like laloo, mulayam, paswan, left parties, sonia will all crawl out and scare the living daylights out of the minorities.
If the BJP does come to power the next time, i'd expect Arun Jaitley to be the party president and Advani to become the PM.
