Modi – The Man, the Mantra & the Matra

Some years back, when ‘social’ in India was in its teens, grasping and grabbing every eye and ear along the way to its tumor, in one sneaky corner, hid an agenda, so potent yet so silent that none of the drumheads noticed it.

Politics in India changes every day yet stays the same. These are men & women (hardly) who decide the destiny of our Country, yet most of them don’t even know how to write their names in ink. It’s a clan of pseudo-intellectuals trying to solve the unending mystery of a democracy. More than 1.2 Billion people (increasing by the minute) to listen to, who wouldn’t want to turn deaf?

Then at times, the country twists into a paradigm shift. Lines are crossed, people enraged beyond control. It happens mostly when there has been monotony in the ruling Government. One word yields hurls of abuses by the chaiwalas and the mazdoors, ultimately knocking the doors of the middle class and their ration, proceeding swiftly towards the A-classes and the Sunday brunches suddenly become all too ‘mehenga’. ‘The Government is in trouble, bro’.

Like a true Indian mother, who finds her way into mending the most broken of clothes, one tends to find solutions. Here comes into picture the ‘social’, ‘intellectual’ and ‘religious’ cult. They say, we listen, we absorb, we vote.

Now this is not the hardest code to crack. But as they say, timing is the most crucial aspect in Politics. One man saw it coming, long before others woke up from their slumber. He had three hillocks to conquer – the social, the mindful (eh!) and the religious. If you’ve read carefully, you’ll know we’ve reached where we started.

So, the gentleman realized the importance of the transition of ‘social’ in Indian societal architecture. He knew it was going web, he knew it was his only chance. He prepared a four-letter mantra and started feeding it into the brains of the young suffering from the adversities of a hard economy and a witless Government. It was all they saw hope in. ‘Modi’ had become their only light. There were watches, badges, bags, tees, mugs, mobiles, bands, skins, humans, undershirts, overshirts, midshirts, brainshots and much more to my and your liking.

As they grew, so did the chant. The virus had slowly swept the entire Internet. Till date some of them don’t even know what Modi means. The controls and the Vs of keyboards slowly started fading and losing their importance as fingertips befriended them and practice never failed.

The Social was conquered. What remained were the thinkers and the saffron-greens. Saffrons were friends, friends trust easy. Greens were exasperated with digression, searching for alternatives in their hearts; they would always be the gambler’s fallacy.

The grey matter caste would defy the brother at chance. They’re sheer loners, drifting as their interests varied. So he borrowed their cloak to look like one of them and decided that here’s what he could be the best – A social phenomena, wrapped up in a multi-faceted charisma of secularism wearing the thinker’s hat, gambling with all his might to feed the curiosity of more than a billion, along with his own.

With just days left to the battle of 2014, the suspense has reached its epitome, the ‘janta’ struggling to decide between the rights and the wrongs. The mantra has no doubt hit most of the matra. He knows it has worked better than his expectations, skimming his overestimation of the heads of the Aam. I know for one, if Modi is not going to be a DDLJ blockbuster, it is most definitely going to be the ‘Chennai Express’ of our times – no romance, no Gods, only one man, defying all odds.

Future smirks mysteriously with the answers in its pockets. Till the next.

The Four Letter Syndrome

With the Mother of all Elections just around the corner (they use the term every 5 years), all our living space has been forcefully, and sometimes with choice, filled with star lights of political game-changers and the tradebacks. The Poli-sphere seems to be filled with three brands – Rahul Chhap, Modi Chhap and Kejri Chhap.

If you look at the growth graph of the aforementioned dignitaries, one thing is clear, there is a masala movie in the making. I recently read somewhere; it’s an election between a ‘duffer’, a ‘bluffer’ and a ‘muffler’, and I’d like to add – The junta will suffer.

I write this piece on a day when I find myself a little convinced with regards to my political know-how (which can be compared to the square of a scrap). With my sudden afternoon coffee in my hand, I couldn’t help but notice the non-stop carcass music of some channel going on and on about Kejriwal’s declaration of fighting the elections from Varanasi.

I thought, what a guy. Poor muffler doesn’t even know how deep a trouble he’s in. Fighting the ‘Dharmasevak’ in the land of vermillion! I confess I wasn’t impressed. Why would you make a Rahul Gandhi out of you? Why wouldn’t you fight from someplace safe? Why wouldn’t you defy the odds and go to Delhi to proclaim the heroship? Why would you simply not leave the four-letter madness and rise above everything else for a cleaner image?

And then it hit me. Because he was smart. Smarter than most of us. The Why-Nots started sounding more practical. Here’s a muffler, struggling to find its place in the Indian democratic ‘satta’, being explained as ‘the man who flouts the balances’, with a cause noble or without – a Man who has been able to crack the code. Why wouldn’t he? What a guy.

Mr. Modi has taken years to reach this point. He’s fought wars and conquered routs. He has slowly, not very smartly, but gradually hued the entire internet. Similarly, he has, again, slowly encrypted the hearts of young men starving for jobs. He has become a household name over the years. Kejriwal has stolen the lock to the 2014 Elections, though I personally believe that Modi still holds the key.

Back to the point, Arvind has forced the ‘Media’ into swallowing their own poison. By announcing to contest from Varanasi, he will have constant over-excited media frenzy at his behest, which will most definitely help his party. Also, when he loses, he will also have a chance to say – ‘Kisi ki himmat thi?’ and start with his over sung ballad of rebelling the methodical.

For once, let’s look at a scenario where India votes to acquire the Four Letter Syndrome. I wonder – is Modi prepared? There's a lot that he has to prove. It is very easy to love an idea, equally difficult to stop hating the reality. I wonder if India will be patient after Modi becomes the PM. Will they even wait a week for food, jobs and dreams? Even if the purple colored development model is feasible, can Modi do it in a mere 5 years? Fir kya? Every dream that has been doing the ‘Modi-Modi’ jaap since the last five years, will it wait another five years to come to existence? Reform takes time, and support, and Modi has been at odds with both. Will the paper planes learn to fly?

If you ask me, I am scared to bits. What if our choices lead to something big and uneasy? What if I am forced into elections after elections? What if all my money one day vanishes from my accounts and they name the act ‘another scam’? What if I start being scared of my own religion?


Future smirks mysteriously with the answers in its pockets. Till the next.