Is Modi’s Prime Time Over? The Strongman Who Suddenly Can’t Find Parliament
Is Modi’s Prime Time Over? The
Strongman Who Suddenly Can’t Find Parliament
For twelve years, Narendra Modi has been marketed as India's
fearless strongman a leader who bows to nobody, fears nobody, and can
supposedly stare down the world. Yet put Rahul Gandhi across from him in
Parliament with uncomfortable questions, and suddenly India's most powerful man
seems to discover that there are many other interesting places to be.
Rahul Gandhi's questions are increasingly direct: what
happened with the allegations surrounding the Ram Temple? Who was responsible
for brutality against protesting students? What happened to promises made to
those students? Why are education, examinations and unemployment producing so
much anger among the young? These are not particularly complicated questions.
The difficulty appears to be finding somebody in the government willing to
answer them.
The student movement may be an even bigger headache. Young
Indians are organizing around education, jobs, examinations and accountability,
and young women have been especially outspoken. The old formula apply pressure,
frighten a few people, attack their character, and wait for everyone to go home
is becoming less reliable. Even teenagers are openly mocking the image that
took the BJP years and enormous political machinery to build.
For years, India was repeatedly reminded of Modi's famous “56-inch
chest.” Now some young female protesters have turned that macho branding into
ridicule, using chants such as “56 inch ka chhota bandar” and “Bol Narendra,
bol Narendra.” Politics has a cruel sense of humor: you can spend years
manufacturing the image of an unbeatable strongman, but once schoolgirls start
making jokes about the strongman, no advertising agency can easily put the
toothpaste back into the tube.
Meanwhile, Rahul Gandhi keeps talking to students. For years
the BJP told India that Rahul was “Pappu,” while Modi was the great Vishwaguru.
Strange things happen in politics. The “Pappu” is now asking questions in
Parliament while the Vishwaguru appears considerably more comfortable
addressing audiences where nobody interrupts him with follow-up questions.
Then consider the extraordinary insolvency case involving
Subhash Chandra. An NCLT-approved resolution provides creditors roughly ₹6.5
crore against admitted claims of approximately ₹22,006 crore, although Chandra
disputes how the larger figure has been characterized. Imagine someone robbing
a bank of ₹50 crore. Television studios would probably run countdown clocks and
special graphics for a month. But when creditors face losses measured in
thousands of crores, the vocabulary becomes wonderfully civilized: insolvency,
haircut, resolution plan. Apparently, adding enough zeroes can transform
outrage into financial terminology.
This feeds directly into Rahul Gandhi's larger attack: wealth
becoming concentrated among a few powerful interests while ordinary Indians
struggle with education, employment and opportunity. India can build grand
projects, make enormous announcements and repeatedly declare itself a
Vishwaguru, but a young graduate still has the irritating habit of asking, “Where
is my job?”
That is the political change Modi should worry about. His
greatest strength was never merely winning elections; it was convincing India
that challenging him was pointless. Modi looked unbeatable, Shah looked
unstoppable, the BJP machinery looked enormous, and Rahul Gandhi was supposedly
the punch line. But the punch line refused to disappear. Rahul lost elections,
got mocked, walked across India, kept talking to people, and became more
aggressive. Today he carries the Constitution, talks to students, questions the
concentration of wealth and repeatedly challenges Modi and Shah.
Rahul has said he will not allow Modi and Shah to sleep
peacefully politically and has predicted the government will fall. That
prediction may or may not come true. But the BJP already has another problem: the
Rahul Gandhi it spent years manufacturing for television no longer resembles
the Rahul Gandhi it has to confront politically. The BJP called him “Pappu” so
many times that perhaps it eventually started believing its own advertising.
Now “Pappu” is standing in Parliament asking questions while
the supposed strongmen seem remarkably busy elsewhere. Even worse for Modi, the
generation he needs to impress is no longer necessarily intimidated by the
carefully manufactured image of power. When young women start turning “56 inch”
from a symbol of strength into the punch line of a street chant, the problem is
no longer opposition politics; the brand itself is being laughed at.
For twelve years, Modi's most powerful political asset was
the belief that Narendra Modi could not be defeated. Rahul Gandhi may not have
defeated Modi yet, but he appears to be attacking something almost as
important: the fear surrounding Modi.
And once the fear disappears and the jokes begin, even a
Vishwaguru has to start watching the clock.
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