By N. S. Venkataraman

During the last 6 years, after assuming the position as Prime Minister of India, there is no doubt that Mr. Narendra Modi has been striving hard to decisively improve the conditions in India in several spheres and in various walks of life. He has launched a number of meaningful, appropriate and innovative schemes that can have potentially far reaching impact on the country for the better. Such schemes are meant to bring about fundamental changes in the lifestyle and thought process of Indians. Some of the schemes that have been initiated are the first time efforts in India.

Multiple beneficial schemes and efforts

Mr.Modi has launched schemes to meet multi various needs of the poor and downtrodden people like housing for the poor , construction of thousands of toilets for poor house holds, electrification of rural areas, zero bank account for the poor people. He has taken steps to ensure that the benefits of the welfare measures would directly reach the poor people, has launched health insurance schemes for the poor, crop insurance schemes for the farmers etc.,

Clean India Campaign, promotion of yoga culture and skill development programme for youth are unique measures to improve the overall fibre and fabric of the Indian society.

Mr.Modi has made significant efforts to eradicate corruption in the government departments and public life. Realising the fact that without modifying and changing the systems=, corruption can not be wiped out, several measures were initiated uch as digitalization, anti benami law, Insolvency and bankruptcy regulations etc. Disciplinary actions against corrupt and inefficient bureaucrats at top level in central government has been taken, which has never been done on such scale before.

As part of stick and carrot policy, several raids on corrupt institutions and individuals have been launched to unearth tax evaded black money and corrupt dealings. Some “big names” involved in banking operations, media and business houses have been caught and jailed or actions initiated.

Corruption is so deeply rooted in the country that it cannot be wiped out in one stroke. It goes to the credit of Mr.Modi that anti corruption measures are now gradually yielding results, though it still has a long way to go.

While Mr. Modi has been reasonably successful in some of the schemes that has been launched, with regard to a few other schemes, there have been some hurdles, and bottlenecks, with progress not matching the needs and expectations. Certainly, the lack of sufficient success in corrective steps have not been due to lack of efforts, but in spite of it due to the huge challengers involved.

Some significant steps in second term

In the last few months, some of the steps taken by Mr. Modi are very significant that would correct historical mistakes that happened in India.

Abolition of Triple Talaq Practice has liberated women belonging to Islam religion from harassment by men folk and restored the dignity of the Muslim women. Steps taken for abolition of Article 370 and effectively integrating Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh with rest of India is a bold measure of far reaching significance, which earlier governments did not have the courage to do.

Citizen Amendment Act and NRC to regularize the citizenship in India is necessary, as the country should know, who are the citizens of India and who are not the citizens living in India at present . The government has convincingly explained the logic of the policy to provide Indian citizenship to harassed people belonging to minority communities in three neighbouring countries. However, this logic appear to have fallen on deaf ears of the critics and false rumours amongst the Muslim community has been spread by t persons ashe motivated critic. Government has clearly said that Muslims living in India would not be affected in India in any way but the vested interests do not want to hear this and continue to spread false rumours , that is causing violence.

Such measures have been initiated by Modi government in a democratic way with the approval of the Parliament.

Courage of conviction

Mr.Modi has taken these measures clearly knowing that such steps would be resisted by vested interests and would lead to communal interpretation and would be described by motivated persons as religious agenda. Mr. Modi has acted with courage of conviction. Future history will judge these measures to be very appropriate and certainly they would stand the test of time.

Motivated critics and hate campaigners

Almost all proactive measures initiated by Mr. Modi have been criticized by certain opposition parties, section of media and also by section of the so called intellectuals and activists, who do not appear to have neutral mindset and unbiased views.

It is very obvious that several political leaders and businessmen who have been caught due to corrupt dealings and now are on bail and several groups getting inspiration from abroad and NGOs receiving funds from abroad who do not submit audited accounts and who have been justifiably banned from receiving funds from abroad do everything possible to unseat Mr.Modi from power. Political parties who are increasingly getting scared due to popular image of Mr.Modi have been instrumental in the hate Modi campaign. It should be noted that though Mr. Modi’s party has lost a few state assembly elections, the share of votes for Mr. Modi’s party has not gone down. Obviously, un principled political alignments between opposition parties have caused such setback.

Unfortunately, the critics, hate campaigners and section of media do not seem to realize that while they want to damage the image of Mr.Modi by using abusive language and describing Mr. Modi as Hitler, Nazi, Fascist, and even as thief, they are spoiling the reputation of India in the global sphere.

In a noisy democracy that India has, section of motivated media being owned by businessmen, politicians and religious institutions and Modi haters, the editors and anchors seem to have fixed agenda and partisan views. Their sole aim seem to be to denigrade Mr. Modi at any cost, without recognizing the good that he has done. Such media is excessively publicizing and even going to the extent of justifying the recent violence in the country against the Citizenship Amendment Act. While students in a very few universities have protested, there are large number of universities and students in the country who are not protesting. Media is projecting only the protesting students. Why is this?

Need for effective communication

Those who are in the know of things and have balanced perspectives think that Mr.Modi is sinned against rather than sinning.

Obviously, Mr. Modi’s progressive policies and far sighted schemes are not being adequately publicized and communicated to the people in a way that common man can understand.

There have been lot of unsubstantiated propaganda in the media that Indian economy has slowed down and is in the verge of collapse. It is said that unemployment level in the country has reached an unmanageable level. It is also said that recession has set in India.

Unfortunately, knowledgeable discussions with facts and figures are not much publicized in the media and most of the editors publish only articles and conduct discussions by those who agree with their views. Several examples can be cited. For example, the renewable energy capacity in India has increased in spectacular manner after Mr. Modi came to power and is likely to reach 100 GW by 2020. It is now feasible to reach the target of 175 GW by 2022, fulfilling the promise that Modi has given to world community during the World Climate Conference. Why no media discuss this?

Mr. Modi speaks in parliament and in all meetings only in Hindi language, which large section of the country men in non Hindi speaking regions do not understand. Several central government schemes are given title in Hindi language such as Ayushman Bharat, Ujwala Yojana, Swachch Bharat, Sabka Viswas, Atal Bhujal Yojana and these title are like Greek and Latin for people in the non Hindi regions. Most of them do not understand these titles and think that they are really some matter not connected to them.

Today, major problem faced by Mr. Modi is due to the fact that his plans and schemes are not being explained to the people with facts and figures by credible spokespersons at different levels in various languages. It remains to be seen as to how Mr. Modi will tackle this issue.

The success of Mr. Modi in facing the onslaught of opposition parties, motivated critics, section of media and hate campaigners depend upon how he would deploy the credible spokespersons all over the country to explain the issues in proper perspective.

It would be tragic if well intentioned moves of Mr. Modi will remain unexplained to large sections of country men who may not have the acumen to readily understand the implications and significance of the progressive policy measures.