Parliament: Narendra Modi's Special Session is a Winner With Ifs and Buts

PM Modi ahead of the special session. 

(Photo: PTI)

If Narendra Modi was a Millennial or a Gen X-er, this year's September may well be called his amazing birthday month.

The prime minister of the world's largest democracy, who turned 73 on 17 September with the inauguration of a special legislative session that slid into a new parliament building, is a meticulous and articulate event planner.

Everything that we have seen this month so far shows that he has worked out things with a sense of precision with an eye on the general elections only a few months away.

Or maybe, there is a force up there that plans everything out for him.

Yet, as the special session of India's parliament winds up in a shiny new building that mixes ancient architectural symbols with paperlessly futuristic technology in style, we are reminded of a famous quote mostly attributed to former British PM Harold Wilson, "A week is a long time in politics."

Modi's Teflon Coating Holding Strong

With one more week to go in Modi's birthday month, we need to still figure out whether he can hold on to the clear political gains he has scored with a mix of action and optics in a dream run over the past four weeks or so.

We first saw India's Chandrayaan-3 land on the moon with a moving rover that brought a Neil Armstrong moment for the country. As the moon venture smoothly completed its planned fortnightly mission, Modi segued into a G20 summit of global leaders in New Delhi's Bharat Mandapam laden with historic and nationalistic symbols and then waltzed into the special session that moved from the old to the new parliament building.

That completed the imagery of what his followers flexibly describe him and India as per convenience: A Vishwaguru of our times wrapped in ancient glory.

The special parliament session in the new building after a visible walk of trooping MPs from the old circular British-era structure was something like icing on the cake, if we may be forgiven an English metaphor. Maybe it is time to call it the rabri on the jalebi, in the style of Modi followers repainting the old with the ancient in a new show of power.

A hard look shows little evidence to suggest that the opposition's political bullets are penetrating Modi's (and his BJP's) teflon-coated popularity ratings that remain high.

Yet, the devil may lie in the details because public memory has this habit of being overshadowed by events.

BJP's Victory With the Women's Reservation Bill

There is little doubt that Modi, who has already got phrases like Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao in his overloaded bag of socio-political slogans, is neck-and-neck with the opposition Congress in wooing India's decidedly new vote bank: women.

The smooth passage of the Women's Reservation Bill to reserve a third of Lok Sabha seats for women in both houses of the legislature is certainly a victory for Modi.

This is significant because Congress has historically championed the quota for women despite having allies in the male-dominated backward caste-centred parties.

Congress has been a reluctant but cooperative ally in Modi's surprise initiative but has already parked time-bombs in its comments on how the Bill may eventually be just another jumla (political slogan) because walking the talk of implementing the reservation will involve a nationwide census followed by a controversial redrawing (delimitation) of Lok Sabha seats that is years away.

Typically, imagery wins in the short run, and details in the long run. That is politics for you.

With the Congress and its allies having crafted a clever template to woo housewives and other women through its state government schemes in Karnataka, Rajasthan, and Chhattisgarh (from free bus travel to monthly handouts to gas cylinder subsidies), the BJP cannot claim a monopoly over charming female voters.

As elections draw near, imagery must be backed by real action on the ground. There is already talk centred around BJP's Madhya Pradesh development schemes and the rollback of cooking gas cylinder prices, that Modi may speak against electoral "freebies", that he calls muft ki revdis but when it comes to the election chessboard, he has little option but to match the moves.

Modi certainly surprised most Indians well by mixing the women's quota Bill with the new parliament building but Congress has been elegantly shrewd in its response.

Its support for the Constitutional amendment introduced on Ganesh Chathurthi day was loud, its claim over its parentage clear and its reservations about the reservation being implemented anytime soon murmured gently with the intent of it making it grow loud over time.

India-Canada: Modi's Black Swan Moment?

With Congress and the BJP dancing like elephants in a political waltz, the other parties have little option but to sit on the sidelines, but when it comes to election time, they may demand their pound of flesh.

The irony is that anything to do with the women's reservation bill might still figure in party manifestos because of the built-in time bombs inside the shining new law.

More importantly, Modi may be having a Black Swan moment in both domestic and global politics in a way that seems strangely interlinked. The raging controversy over India and Canada expelling each other's diplomats linked to the killing of a Sikh Canadian Khalistani separatist is tricky because of Canada's presence among Western powers.

While India claims sovereignty and legitimacy in diplomatic action, the harsh reality is that given India's border problems and geographical location next to China (not to speak of their economic rivalry), a Western tilt has been a historical necessity. That is now under a shadow of doubt.

Will this translate into some embarrassment for Modi in domestic elections? I won't jump to any conclusion but it can be said that it is difficult to be a strategic partner for the West (something that Modi followers flaunt alongside Hindu pride) while maintaining ramrod-straight sovereignty.

The Ramesh Bidhuri Row

The latest uproar involving BJP member Ramesh Bidhuri in Lok Sabha over his venomous outpouring against a Muslim member of the Bahujan Samaj Party is a global challenge to Modi trying to be a new-age statesman.

Only days earlier, he was tangentially praising Jawaharlal Nehru and saying sorry for any misdeeds by twinning his harmony talk with the Jain occasion of Kshamavani in which people seek forgiveness from others. Who is going to apologise if the BJP is seen as partisan and venomous? Kshamavani is officially due on Septmber 30.

The planned India Middle-East-Europe Corridor (IMEC) that was flaunted with the G-20 summit runs through the Islamic world and what happened in Lok Sabha does not paint a pretty portrait of Modi's party. Picture abhi baaki hai mere dost (The movie is not over), a line popularised by Shah Rukh Khan in Bollywood, may well be valid here.

Modi has to choose between himself as a populist Hindutva ideologue and a towering statesman fancied by future historians. There is a limit to which one can ride contradictions, though the art of politics is often described as management of contradictions.

With one more week to go in September and, Harold Wilson's quote still fresh in our minds, we can be sure that more will happen in due course. Indians being the biggest cricket lovers on the planet may yet get opiated by the forthcoming World Cup to forget everything else.

Future historians don't help win elections. Ordinary citizens of the present day do. The BJP has won a headstart with Modi's smart event planning linked to the special session but the prime minister is batting on a wicket that can be uneven in its bounce.

(The writer is a senior journalist and commentator who has worked for Reuters, Economic Times, Business Standard, and Hindustan Times. He can be reached on Twitter @madversity. This is an opinion article and the views expressed are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)