Narendra Modi and the rise of a new elite

And, we have a brand new Government of India, headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). This is a government that has the undisputed mandate of the people. There are those who may argue, till the cows come home, about the percentage and number of votes cast; but the fact remains that ours is a first-past-the-post system and the BJP has won more seats than all others put together.

As data come in, people conduct various forms of post poll analyses. As reporters talk to ordinary voters, and you yourself interact with more and more people what is evident is that people voted for Modi rather than the party; and that they voted against the Congress, the UPA partners and some major regional satraps who can routinely hold the central government to ransom. Modi’s victory is as much about the decimation of the Congress, as it is about marginalising state-level parties, and reducing them to absolutely local-level players in those areas where they still exist. The AIADMK, and the BJD are prime examples of this — they won, but they are limited to their respective states, with their central influence severely marginalised. In other cases, the political graveyard beckons — for the Samajwadi Party or the Communists, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) or the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS). Even NDA allies who won, won less on their merit and more as a result of the BJP election juggernaut. What Modi has done is reduced them to near irrelevance, at least in the short run. In most of these cases the parties’ connect with the voter base is deeply frayed, and they have ceased to represent local level aspirations and ‘pride’. They have become a family-run enterprise. The moment a party that is supposed to represent the people becomes a family-run entity, then sooner or later, it loses touch with the people it claims to represent. The other problem is that fresh blood, fresh ideas, and passion cease to be injected into the system because there is no hope for growth unless you are part of the family. These parties have a grave future ahead of them and the only way to avert death is to free up parties from family control. The Congress as well as the SP or the DMK, or the MNS and the SS have to redefine their existence in the context of the 21st century that goes beyond the family name of its strongest leaders.

The other important aspect of the elections is it is the most significant one in terms of India’s overall construct. A large number of Indians did not vote for regional or even local issues, or even because of caste or religious affiliations. They voted for a Government of India. The lesson for parties is that they need to fight on issues other than identity. Their raison d’être has to go beyond their past. They have to be future ready and that means, at the very least, the promise of not just governance, but also a promise of hope for a better tomorrow. With the permeation of the media, distances within India and with the outside world have shrunk. Voters have glimpses of lives that are more comfortable than their own — better roads, better jobs, better infrastructure, water in taps, schools with teachers and hospitals with doctors — and they have realised there is a world not so far away from their own where things work. The burgeoning middle class, which includes cab drivers and maids, shop assistants and courier boys, office assistants and drivers, aspire for a better tomorrow, not just for the next generation but for themselves as well. They have been most impacted by inflation, often finding themselves at the precipice from where slipping back into the ‘poor’ category again is a reality. Their world is less about austerity and more about the desire to consume. Also, as the middle-class base increases, people define themselves less by what they do and more by who they are as people and aspirations.

The last factor to consider is the change of elite. India is no longer run by the old elite. Even since liberalisation began in the early 1990s a change in society has been underway. A new elite has begun coming up in every field — from media to telecom, from construction to retail. It has been the era of the calculated risk-taker, the buccaneer who has the vision and foresight to invest in newer areas — the areas at the outskirts of rarefied upper class city centres that have the potential to develop into new cities, where the new elite would live; or service sectors that employed this new elite. This new stratum in India, is bound by, at best, loose ties of caste, religion or linguistic identity. It may follow various customs and traditions, celebrations and rituals of their associations, but those have very little role in their lives. This elite is all about meritocracy. It has arrived as the first generation achievers in every field. You see them in all sectors – people from smaller towns, people from humble backgrounds achieving great heights.

In the last decade the two men at the helm — Manmohan Singh and Narendra Modi — were not from the elite. Far from it. Both of them acknowledged it in their speeches to the nation. Singh said, “I, an underprivileged child of Partition, was empowered enough to rise and occupy high office.” and Modi said, "It is proof of the strength of our Constitution that a man from a poor family is standing here today." It is this that has changed in the core of India — the ability to move across economic and social strata, and not see India through older prisms. India, possibly for the first time in memory, is becoming upwardly socially mobile. People can aspire to more than they were born into. And, they can hope to achieve it. The election results reflect that.

The author is Head, Digital Content, Zee Media Corporation @calamur