A lot of catching up to do

The forthcoming Indian elections have captivated the Western world. Many are observing in awe the march of nearly a billion people to the polls. Some are wide-eyed in admiration; others plot and scheme in trepidation to counter India’s new self-affirmation. The thoughts everywhere are: Is Prime Minister Narendra Modi a consummate politician who deserves emulation by others dedicated to democracy or an autocratic Hindu-majoritarian wolf in sheep’s clothing?

This will be a momentous election and an inflection point in India’s growth trajectory and place in the world. Like any powerful leader, Modi is both adored by many who hope to finally encounter prosperity, self-respect and better lives and reviled by others who see an assault on the democratic, governance and moral values they treasure.

By 2028, India, currently the world’s fifth largest economy, is expected to overtake Germany and Japan to rank third after the US and China. India can achieve at least 6 per cent average annual growth soon, while long-term potential growth of 8 per cent is also achievable. But Modi and his successors may still be unable to lift India to developed country status by 2047 to celebrate its first century as a free nation.

Since his rise to power in 2014, Modi has surprised governments and intellectual elites in the US and Europe by caring little for their assertions on how he should behave to be in line with their ideas on steering world affairs. Since the 1970s, Western nations have worked forcefully to promote values and norms based on 18th century ‘Enlightenment’ in France that are now embedded in the United Nations Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and rules governing relations among Nation States.  

The Enlightenment’s central doctrines were individual liberty and religious tolerance, in opposition to an absolute monarchy and the power of religious authorities. These ideas spread after the French revolution (1789-99) that led eventually to the separation of Church and State. After the Second World War, these ideas were entrenched in international norms promoted by the US and its allies through the UN system.

They emerged from European history, particularly the 150 years of religious wars in Europe over ‘true’ Christianity after the Protestant Reformation upended Roman Catholic supremacy. They were capped by the 20th century’s catastrophic European First and Second World Wars, the end of Europe’s empires and colonies, and the rise of dooms-day nuclear weapons.

The UN helped to proclaim most Enlightenment ideas to be ‘universal values’ for all humankind. It is through these ‘liberal’ prisms that Western think-tanks and policy makers stand in moral judgement of modern India and find that Modi falls grievously short.

Western liberals look upon Modi with distaste as a Hindu-leaning theocratic authoritarian. But they also admire him for doubling India’s GDP, attracting unprecedented investments from global companies and opening pathways for local entrepreneurs to become dollar millionaires and billionaires. These liberals profess values like inclusion, diversity and equality but are having trouble in sharing the world with previously quiescent populations like Indians, who now prefer to live by their own values rather than as acolytes of the religious and cultural histories of Europeans.  

On the world stage, Modi’s rise asserts the difference of Indians from other civilisations. This is causing apprehension because Western elites are used to being followed. They are perplexed that Modi’s India now emphasises partnership in all matters and leadership in some instead of being an ingratiating disciple as often in the past.

If Modi returns as expected with greater electoral and political capital, American and European leaders will have to make further compromises to treat India as an equal partner. Ahead of that, almost in panic, major Western think-tanks and human rights watchdogs have taken to loudly finding flaws in Modi’s political, social and religious attitudes.

They have branded Indians as being ‘partly free’ despite the nation’s robust electoral democracy and vociferous civil society. They are denigrating India for curbing freedom of expression and association despite its ferocious trade unions, press and media. By some estimates, India has 400 television channels and over 100,000 print outlets in multiple languages, which far exceeds any country in the West.

Modi has many flaws but the views of many Western intellectuals and policy makers may just reflect their habitual inability to share the world of ideas more equitably. That said, Modi has a lot of catching up to do. Nearly 800 million Indians are so poor that they need the government’s free food grain scheme for another five years.  

he author is an international affairs columnist for Business India. He can be contacted at brijkk@gmail.com