The nation can move forward by 125 crore steps: Modi.
By Rajiv Theodore
NEW DELHI: The stupor that the country slipped into is slowly wearing off. The somnolence is giving way to a restrained enthusiasm and energy as a strange breeze craving for change is sweeping here.
From professors to bus drivers, from house-wives to shopkeepers, from students to business magnates, the yearning for a change has been palpable. The drag-the-feet policy of the previous government in each and every aspect of governance had left people seething and in sheer disgust.
And change has come roaring and thundering, not like a gentle breeze though, like many expected it to be. The manner in which the change came, simply reflected the desire of the people for a new and better tomorrow as it voted the BJP to power.
This has also meant that Narendra Modi’s win and the jubilations that followed with the party members all anointing him once again as their supreme leader, has raised public expectations to a new level.
Some of the immediate tasks at hand are: first and foremost the country’s manufacturing sector has to be lifted from the morass it had gotten into due to an abject lack of proactive policies.
Then there are a rash of infrastructure projects and investment waiting attention. Many of them had been stranded, thanks to bad policies. To be propelled into life also are critical areas like taxation, labor laws, insurance and banking, apart from streamlining a bureaucracy that is slowly getting mired back into red-tapism.
On the social sector there is a need to quickly dispel fear, if minorities are going to be hounded. This was summed up by an editorial in The New York Times which said that although Modi won on the promise of taking the country out from a “moribund economy, end corruption, create millions of jobs and lift millions of people out of poverty†and has “set very high expectations for economic revival and his government, (but) he cannot achieve those goals if he exacerbates sectarian divisions, for example, by using divisive rhetoric against Muslims.’’
And to do all these tasks and more, a hunt for a team has begun in full earnest. For starters, Modi has been appointed Tuesday as the Prime Minister of India by the President who in turn requested him to name the members of the council of ministers.
“The President will administer the oath of office and secrecy on May 26 at 6 pm at Rashtrapati Bhawan,” the President’s spokesperson Venu Rajamony said at a brief media interaction here.
And the buzz is that the top slots could go to Rajnath Singh and Arun Jaitley—the ministries of Home and Finance, respectively. Sushma Swaraj may have to settle for Human Resource Development (HRD) or Health; she may not get the External Affairs ministry which she had hinted for. Other key portfolios are crucial for Modi like Defence, where he would like to go for sweeping modernization and the Commerce ministry which would be a critical pivot in his foreign policy. He is yet to hand pick and zero–in from the probables.
And among the probables are: Ravi Shankar Prasad, Ananth Kumar, Gopinath Munde, Piyush Goel, Rajiv Rudy, Ramesh Bais, Vidyasagar Rao, Harsh Vardhan, Varun Gandhi, Kirit Somaiyya and Jual Oram. Others among the allies include Ramvilas Paswan, Harsimrat Kaur, Anant Geete, Upendra Kushwaha and Anupriya Patel.
After he was elected the leader of the BJP Parliamentary Party by the newly-elected Lok Sabha members and those of Rajya Sabha, Modi gave a 30–minute speech which was lucid, simple but determined on his work, and also marked by emotion where he broke into tears briefly.
“I accept the responsibility you have reposed in me. You will never get an opportunity to look down on what my government will do… The new government will dedicate itself for the poor, crores and crores of youth, and for the safety and security of the mothers and sisters, those in the rural areas, and the oppressed and the deprived…By giving BJP an absolute majority, they have voted for hope and trust. People have voted for hope and faith, and I will do everything to fulfil their aspirations…. I want to assure people that there is no need for pessimism and they should not go by the past bad experience. The country has huge potential. If all countrymen take one step, the nation can move forward by 125 crore steps,†said Modi.