The First One Year Of Modi Govt. – A Honest Appraisal

All of us have been receiving/reading varied comments on the subject – The First one year of Modi Govt. – from different quarters. We happened to see an assessment on this from the well-known scholar- cum- political analyst Dr. S Gurumurthy. It is an interview in two parts. Those interested can see this at:
 
http://www.rediff.com/news/ interview/modi-one-s- gurumurthy-speaks-modi-has- set-right-his-and-indias- image-abroad/20150612.htm
 
and
 
http://www.rediff.com/ business/interview/modi-one-s- gurumurthy-land-bill-is-not- anti-agriculture-at-all/ 20150615.htm
 
Well, this is already in circulation on the internet and so, it will be “an already seen” document to many. Our sincere apology to them. In order not to tax the patience of the busy men in life, we have indicated the links only, but the full interview is worth reading any day.
In any appraisal of any system, one can always find out some fault lines. We are quiet aware of some of these. Yet, as it is said, it is good to look at the positives first. According to Gurumurthy, Narendra Modi has, in the first year “turned all the negatives to positives.”
To the question whether the Prime Minister was being targeted for having said “achhe din” which is yet to come, Gurumurthy said:
 
•       No. The unadmitted truth is that the media hates him and they will always hate him. They were the ones who said this man was a Hitler and had killed 4000 Muslims; they later reduced it to 2000 and now it (the toll) stands at 1000. A shameless media pretending to be neutral targeted him for 12 years. Some of them went to the extent of creating the suspicion that the Godhra tragedy was enacted by Modi to justify killing Muslims! This fraudulent theory was assisted by a United Progressive Alliance-sponsored commission of inquiry which said the tragedy was an accident, not a conspiracy.
•       It is the English media that dominates and the language media is only a shadow of the English media, even though it is several times bigger. Opinions are created by the English-speaking elite media and many of them have nothing to do with the real India but these are the people who set the agenda for India and inform the world. No foreign media will quote a language media even though it might command a readership much higher than the English media. The NGO which worked in conspiracy with the Indian media proclaimed that they got the Americans to deny visa to Modi! The Economistmagazine wrote, ‘we cannot be persuaded to support this man’. See the kind of hatred they had generated then within India which echoed outside.
 
Gurumurthy then observes, “Can you imagine the deficit he had to cover? Trust deficit and legitimacy deficit of the victorious Modi transformed into national discredit of having elected a leader with such deficits. But in one year, he has completely overturned the situation. Has any newspaper written one word on this?”
 
To a specific question as to what were the positives achieved, he summarises:
 
What Modi has achieved in terms of India’s strategic relationship and economic benefits from abroad is something unbelievable in 365 days. He has made America accept our nuclear liability clause. He has made Australia and Canada give 3500 tonnes of uranium. He has not only made China commit to invest $20 billion, but he has told China about setting right the negative trade deficit, implying anti-dumping duties against them. (We have over $ 400 billion in current account deficit). Manmohan Singh, who was virtually crawling before the Chinese president, allowed the nation to run up a trade deficit of $ 375 billion in 10 years. Modi got $ 35 billion investment from Japan and then from EU too. In 365 days, he has turned all the negatives into positive, from (-) 5 to (+) 7. Did any analyst write about the negative scores he had had to overcome in and outside India? They wrote as if he began writing on a clean slate.
 
The Prime Minister is often critcised for neglecting the home front. To this Gurumurthy says:
 
•       On the home front, he is building a powerful foundation for the country’s economy. What are the things that have been missing till now? We were not able to reach people in terms of financial inclusion. No foreign economists or the RBI would say the person who has no money should have a bank account. That was the policy till now. Here, our need is, everybody should have a bank account, only then could we put money in his account. The RBI agreed to have one crore bank accounts in three years. The finance ministry said, three crore bank accounts in one year. But Modi wanted 7 .5 crore bank accounts in five months. Do you know what the latest tally is? 16.5 crore bank accounts. The scaling up of the operation Jan Dhan Yojana is unthinkable.
•       Take the gold monetisation scheme and the MUDRA refinance scheme — a remarkably India-specific idea. All these are India-centric ideas which neither the Indian nor the foreign media will write about. You take any measure by Narendra Modi; it is not intended for today’s results; the result will be permanent. He is planning a socio-economic structure which will be solid for the country whether Modi is the prime minister or somebody else. ‘Land bill is not anti-agriculture at all’- June 15, 2015. ‘MUDRA bank, Jan Dhan Yojna or gold or insurance schemes, nothing have been approved by foreign experts’, ‘Modi has recovered from minus and gone into plus. It is unthinkable in one year’, ‘Oil price reduction is not the sole reason for all the positives of the Modi government’.
 
The second part of the interview dealt more with Gurumurthy’s suggestions for the days to come.
 
Towards the end, he said:
 
•       Modi is addressing an area not addressed by any government, like the MUDRA Bank addressing the credit needs of six crore micro and small businesses. This he can do in the next two-three years. Since the banks are not reaching them, he has created a new mechanism to give credit to them. Once he does it, the face of the Indian economy will change. They are now borrowing by paying 60 to 120 per cent interest and if you give them funds at 12-13% interest, many of the six crore micro entrepreneurs will open two more shops and employ four more persons. Once they lend at 12 pc, the others also have to cut the rates. This was what happened at the transport finance sector. Similarly, intervention by MUDRA Bank will be very effective. These people are also perpetually in debt due to illness and accidents and when the insurance scheme takes care of these things, their quality of life will improve. They are getting the benefits directly from the government. These are fundamental things happening at the bottom level.
 
To a specific question whether. Modiji has done a good job so far, his answer was: He has recovered from minus and gone into plus. It is unthinkable in one year. I thought he would take two years to reverse the opinion of other countries about himself, but he has achieved it in one year. The man who denied a visa to Narendra Modi (US President Barack Obama) came and attended the Republic Day function! It is not a small gesture.