"Sanitation workers became litterbugs on Thursday when they threw plastic bottles and crumpled pieces of paper outside the Red Fort so a Union Minister could get his photo-op while picking up the garbage. This staged littering and cleanliness drive was organised by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) as part of the Swachh Bharat Mission.
"One hundred days of Modi Sarkar and the feedback from much of the thinking class has been gushing. Nothing extraordinary here because governments have traditionally been allowed a grace period when they are not judged. And there is bound to be more than the usual euphoria when the government in question comes in with a full majority, interpreted as a clear mandate to break free from the past.
"Prime Minister Narendra Modi is preparing to address the nation on the radio twice a month. This comes after his promoting himself to a captive audience of school children on Teachers' Day. An exercise is on to solicit the opinion of the Twitterati whether the radio address should be on every second and fourth Sunday of the month or on some other suitable days. One way of looking at this move will be that Modi needs to share his world view with the people of this country directly - without any mediation or distortion.
"The first thing that Prime Minister Narendra Modi did after assuming office was to circulate a note among his cabinet ministers informing them that if he desires he can call for any files of their department which concern policy matters. He also made it clear to them that he can summon any of their secretaries to discuss matters related to the ministry concerned.
"On 15 May, just 24 hours before the historic counting day that confirmed Narendra Modi’s victory, a group of young men and women gathered at an upscale resort here in Sanand, some 60 km from Ahmedabad.
They wore smart casuals and carried iPhones and looked like they were at a corporate offsite In reality, most of them had put on hold their corporate careers to join the Citizens for Accountable Governance, a new kind of animal in India’s political landscape.
"Omidyar Network, as Pando readers know, is the philanthropy arm of eBay billionaire Pierre Omidyar. Since 2009, Omidyar Network has made more investments in India than in any other country in its portfolio. These investments were largely thanks to Jayant Sinha, a former McKinsey partner and Harvard MBA, who was hired in October 2009 to establish and run Omidyar Network India Advisors.
"Individuals don't matter on projects like this. People like Anuraag Khandelwal, Satish deSa, Nilesh Jain, Rajkumar Jha, Pawan Bhatt worked day and night on this campaign; 30 people in Soho Square Mumbai and 20 in Delhi... We were producing 125 artworks every single night for two months. I wrote Ab ki baar Modi Sarkaar and Janta Maaf Nahi Karegi... Anuraag and Nilesh Jain and their team wrote Achche Din Anewale hain. There are some other people who helped me get this work done — Shoojit Sirkar has been my biggest partner, when we were making almost 10 films every night.
"It's May 2. In the BJP war room in Varanasi's Surya Hotel, Amit Shah is huddled over an India map like a general plotting his next move. The phone rings. It's his boss, Narendra Modi. After a public rally in Balrampur, Uttar Pradesh, the BJP prime ministerial candidate is rushing back to Gandhinagar for a 3D holographic speech that will be relayed to 100 locations, mostly in parts of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
Submitted by narendramodifacts on Sat, 05/03/2014 - 04:30
Reading their awkward apologies for Modi, one realises how cleverly the BJP has given liberals with communal/right-wing/power-hungry leanings a bridge to cross over to their side. We know the Parivar is patient - they follow a strategy of "spread the seeds and wait". Put your core ideas out there - let them travel far beyond your normal support-base, move the whole political discourse to the right, and wait... and reap the rewards. As they are doing now. Their reletless communalisation of society is the most obvious example of this strategy. But let's take two other favourites.
This blog recently commented that what makes Narendra Modi stand out amongst right-wing demagogues is a particular confluence of factors: his history, his governance style, and above all the mass movement which holds him aloft, with its vast membership and its portfolio of political, religious, vigilante, and terrorist activity. These, combined with some successful image management, have brought him to the brink of national power.
