Pran Pandit
Late Friday night, while watching a satellite News-Channel, I got to see the Audio-Visual excerpts of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Visva-Bharti University (West Bengal). While the PM Modi was passing through the serene lawns of the Campus in the company of his Bangladesh counterpart Sheikh Hasina and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, one could hear the deafening sound of hand-clapping and chanting of “Modi—Modi—Modi—Modi”; and the aura of the Campus was reminiscent to PM Modi’s maiden official visits to USA, Japan and other countries, the video footage of which I had seen earlier. I have heard Narendra Modi speak on many occasions earlier also but that time, after listening to him and watching his demeanor and body language, the reminiscence of the public speeches of Swami Vivekananda including his inspirational quote “He alone is worshiping God who serves all beings” stirred my mind. As the thoughts can’t be ordered, I was driven to the memory lane to recollect that Swami Atmasthananda of Ramakrishna Mission Rajkot had not allowed Narendra Modi to become a monk in his childhood days and was told that he was meant to do something spectacular in worldly life.
Majority of the country men in India, irrespective of their religious belief or political affiliation, regard Modi as a ‘symbol of honesty and discipline’; they see in him a ‘leader of Vision and Action’; and have a belief, firmly grounded, that he has the ‘will’ and the capacity to fight ‘inequality and injustice’. They wanted the country pulled out of the deep-rooted system of corruption and inefficiency, and, therefore, chose to vote him to power; and in an emphatic electoral victory, the party that projected him as PM candidate (BJP) won 282 Lok-Sabha seats in 2014- Parliamentary Elections, a simple majority on its own, on the back of Narendra Modi- Wave. Narendra Modi, representing the inspirational India, took oath as PM of the world’s greatest democracy on 26th day of the May, 201 4.
This morning, I glimpsed through the 48-month performance report card of PM Modi’s governance which had appeared on the front-page of an English Daily . The performance report-card touched many broader areas including ‘Harnessing Yuva Shakti- Transforming India’, ‘Building a Healthy India’, ‘The world sees a New India’ , ‘Development Reaching the Poorest, Ensuring Better Life for All’, ‘Unwavering Commitment to Social Justice’, ‘New Infrastructure for New India’, ‘Putting Farmers First’, ‘India becomes the Global Growth Engine’, “Realizing India’s Full Potential through Women Led Development”, ‘Eliminating Corruption, Instutionalizing Honesty, Enhancing Transparency’ and ‘Unprecedented Speed and Scale in Transforming the Nation’. I, as a neutral person without any bias against any individual or political party, did ponder over the performance report card analytically and arrived at an opinion by reasoning that: In a short span of 2-3 years, growth of country’s stature in international relations increased substantially; the foreign visits of PM Modi have made the presence of India felt in the international system as an “Emerging Power”, and, the frequent visits helped him ‘building personal equation’ with world leaders for accruing political and economic benefits for the country; India got entry into MTCR (Missile Technology Control Regime) due to the robust diplomatic efforts of Modi Government; “demonetization”, aimed at curbing black money, improving the digital economy and tamping down on terrorist funding, required the ‘Will and Courage’ of highest order which Modi demonstrated in ample measures; ordering the Army to silence Pakistan’s rogue army by launching ‘surgical strikes’ for destroying the launching pads of terrorists in Pakistan required highest order of courage, boldness and decision-making capabilities which Narendra Modi displayed; and his policies, programmes and slew of measures have really helped the common man, poor and the downtrodden to grow. Truly, Modi represents the ‘growth Model’ and is working hard with determination and dedication to fulfill the aspiration of the people of India.
While Narendra Modi is marching ahead tirelessly in the direction of making the nation strong and resilient, his political adversaries are also busy in their own way. For quite some time, different techniques are being employed in an organized manner to whip up hysterical scare and unrest in the country. The people behind the machinations, through their acts of eliciting jingoist fanaticism, create dangerous problems for the country and the government, temporary though; and under the garb of ‘freedom of the press’ and ‘freedom of political thought’ they succeed in getting support from the media also.
They are hell-bent in fabricating atrocities and all sorts of awful things and concoctions to direct and control the thought of countrymen to engineer disorder in the society. India has the reputation of being a ‘tolerant country’ and the people of India do not believe in pseudo-secularism nor do they believe in selective patriotism. A particular class of people is ever-ready and ever- busy in pursuing a policy of generating ill-will and division between the various sections of the people of the country; and, at one point of time, they coined a term ‘growing intolerance ’ with the sole object of creating discontent and converting the pacifistic country to hysteria.
Through the tool of disseminating propaganda that the country’s robust democracy was in danger in the hands of the current political dispensation, they succeeded in creating an atmosphere in which a select-class of intelligentsia returned National/ Literary Awards during the escalation of engineered protests in 2016. All those behind the ugly design stand totally exposed. The students of a university come to the campus to study and build their career rather than getting involved in the politics but the vested interests, inimical to peace and development, lure the young minds with position, power and money and exploit them to manufacture ‘rebellion’ to stir the national politics. Every countryman knows fully well as to who aided and abetted the venom spilling and anti-national sloganeering activities in JNU campus; and who, for achieving the narrow political interests, derived sadistic pleasure by openly supporting the haters of the present political dispensation and anti-national sloganeers. A highest member of the Christian clergy in the national capital issued a diktat for launching a ‘prayer-campaign’ and appealed for fasting on Fridays ahead of the 2019 general elections. ‘As we look forward towards 2019 when we will have new Government, let us begin a prayer campaign for our country’, the Archbishop communicated to parish priests. The people of India are wise enough to understand the designs, contents and the phraseology of the letter of the religious priest.
Man is a social animal; and the social animals tend to herd together with those of their kind to excel in body strength for ruling over the rest. A few days ago, at the venue of Swearing-in of H D Kumaraswamy, as CM of the JDS- INC Coalition Government, 13 National and regional political parties of the country joined hands ahead of 2019-Elections ; and the War-Cry of the “maha gathbandan” was in sight. The people of India, for sure, know that the bonhomie between the arch-rival political parties of different ideologies shall not last long; and they know it for certain that their sole object of coming together is to defeat Narendra Modi, by any means, fair or foul. The desperate politicians, who have lost their home turf, are busy playing dirty tricks to malign Narendra Modi and his party but the people of the country admire him. The country under the able stewardship of Narendra Modi, India has taken a giant, unprecedented leap forward and has put the country on the path of development (sub ka saath aur sub ka vikas). Under privileged look up to Narendra Modi with hope!
On 12 January 2013, on the 150 birth anniversary of Vivekananda, Narendra Modi wrote a blog-post on his personal website to pay tribute to Vivekananda: ‘Arise, Awake and stop not till the goal is reached’, a verse of ‘Katha Upanishad’ which was popularized in the late 19th century by Swami himself. ‘Awake’ denotes the awakening of one’s real nature and the consequent ushering in prosperity. Narendra Modi is awakened and is not going to stop till he achieves the goal ‘ushering in prosperity’ of the people of India; and this inspirational verse gives a rallying call to countrymen including the ‘sleeping souls’ to get out of their hypnotized state of mind and ‘awake’ for ushering in prosperity. While concluding, I confess that I am a ‘fan’ of charismatic leader Narendra Modi!
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