Modi’s global brand building after governance shortfall

Will his efforts at building a larger-than-life image at home and abroad win Narendra Modi support of Nagpur?

After a resounding defeat in Karnataka, the digital propagandists for Prime Minister Narendra Modi are busy churning out proof of his global popularity. They are taking cues from routine affability around the world: Joe Biden’s wisecrack in asking for his autograph, Prime Minister James Marape of Papua New Guinea touching his feet in welcome and being compared in popularity by Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to the legendary rockstar Bruce Springsteen, also known as ‘The Boss’.

Further opportunities will be offered by an unprecedented line-up of foreign engagements. Modi will be in Washington DC for his first ever State visit on June 22. On July 14, he will be in Paris to meet President Emmanuel Macron and attend the Bastille Day Parade. Towards the end of July, Modi will receive leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in India, among them, the Presidents of Russia, China, Iran, and several Central Asian leaders. At the BRICS Summit in August, he will meet Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Brazil’s Lula da Silva, and South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa. To cap it all, he will host the G20 Summit in Delhi, on September 9-10, where, if rumours are to be believed, he could get Putin and Biden to shake hands, if both indeed turn up.

Modi’s international image took a significant beating with the BBC documentary on the 2002 Gujarat riots. Now, the Karnataka election is a warning that his magic with the Indian voter could be waning. Those who claim that this is a South Indian phenomenon should recall that from 2019, the BJP has lost Himachal Pradesh and could not wrest Punjab, West Bengal, Jharkhand, and Delhi from the Opposition. In Haryana and Maharashtra, the BJP’s majority governments were voted out, and have been ruling as uncertain alliances. In Maharashtra, the breaking of the Shiv Sena to form a rag-tag coalition has been criticised by the Supreme Court. Modi is no longer the lucky election mascot that he used to be.

The latest NDTV-CSDS Survey of nine years of Modi’s rule at the Centre adds substance to this idea. There are various ways of reading the survey, but on Modi’s governance record, it presents a dismal picture. Twenty-seven per cent of those surveyed attributed Modi’s popularity to his oratory, and only 11 per cent to his policies. The 21 per cent who are ‘fully unsatisfied’ with his work outnumber the 17 per cent who are ‘fully satisfied’. On his handling of corruption, the 45 per cent who found it unsatisfactory are greater than the 41 per cent who think otherwise.

His government’s use of the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate has 31 per cent responding that it was a ‘tool for political vendetta’ against the 37 per cent saying it was ‘lawful’. On the economy, 42 per cent think their condition has not improved in the last nine years, and 22 per cent think it has worsened.

The margin is thin between the 36 per cent who believe only the wealthy have benefitted from development, against the 38 per cent who think everyone has benefitted. To this may be added the 18 per cent who think that no one has benefitted. Surprisingly, 57 per cent of people polled think the poor should get subsidies such as free water and electricity, which differs from Modi’s stance against revadis or freebies. On some crucial issues the disapproval of governance is resounding — 57 per cent think poorly of his handling of price rise, and 46 per cent are critical of his dealing with farmers’ issues.

While the BJP’s support, according to the survey, has gone up to 39 per cent from 37 per cent in 2019, the support for the Congress has risen from 19 per cent to 29 per cent, Rahul Gandhi’s popularity from 24 per cent to 27 per cent, and the Prime Minister’s popularity has fallen marginally from 44 per cent to 43 per cent. These trends should give food for thought to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which uses the BJP as its political arm.

Modi has always been centre-stage, but there is something unusual with him rushing off to flag-off every new train, inaugurate every highway, bridge, underpass, launch FM radio transmitters, lay the foundation stone of many new projects, and distribute job offer letters. His inauguration of the new Parliament building is controversial as it is seen by the Opposition as stealing the thunder of the President of India.

The flurry on the international stage will perhaps compensate for his declining domestic image to the grey eminences of the RSS in Nagpur. He needs to demonstrate his superiority against all possible contenders within the BJP. The propaganda army has perforce to amplify every act of politeness and affability by world leaders into an exceptional endorsement of Modi’s charisma.

On the flip side, it is increasingly clear that the spectacular events abroad featuring the Indian diaspora are organised exactly like election rallies in India, where attendees are incentivised and bussed in. In fact, a chartered ‘Modi Airways’ flight was organised from Melbourne to Sydney. The Sydney rally was arranged by Friends of India Australia and Indian-Australia Diaspora Foundation — organisations whose office bearers are allegedly associated with overseas Hindutva organisations.

Such mega rallies tend to overawe the host country’s political leaders — leading them to confuse the enthusiasm of the diaspora with Modi’s popularity back home. The prospect of winning the electoral support of Indian-origin voters, perhaps also encourages leaders to endorse Modi with unusual superlatives. Such mega events also overshadow dissent, such as protests by members of the minority community among the diaspora or the screening of the BBC documentary in the Australian parliament during Modi’s visit.

Will his efforts at building a larger-than-life image at home and abroad win Modi support of Nagpur? The fear could be that as the RSS promoted Modi as an alternative to L K Advani in 2014, it may consider replacing him with a more extreme Hindutva icon (such as Yogi Adityanath) or a relatively moderate one (like Nitin Gadkari). Prime Minister Narendra Modi would not want the RSS to even start thinking in that direction.

(Bharat Bhushan is a Delhi-based journalist.)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.