The biggest investment of the common man, trust in the government, is being misspent on non-issues. Leaders of the BJP in the southern state Tamil Nadu have been quick to take umbrage at ‘Mersal’, a popular flick in which the lead character has made some comments on GST and death of infants at a hospital in Gorakhpur that the government has found undesirable.
The Prime Minister is on a trip around Gujarat inaugurating projects or visiting temples, and no particularly innovative proposal for the betterment of people is being presented for the hoi polloi to pin more hopes on.
On other fronts, an interlocutor has been appointed to talk to separatists, marking a U turn in the government’s approach to the Jammu and Kashmir crisis. And as the country approaches the anniversary of demonetisation, there is but little for people to look forward to other than empty promises, more rhetoric and opposition baiting.
Rahul Gandhi is ably mimicking his chief detractor and using uncharacteristically sharp language to hit back at Modi and co, possibly as a kind of rite of passage as the political scion works to establish a firm foothold in his party and national politics.
The government is not just losing grip on its own policies, but having to eat crow and reverse many of its decisions. It appears the judiciary, too, is having doubts about many of its debatable decisions from the recent past.
If the apex court has decided to reconsider its decision against arrest without warrant in dowry harassment cases, it has most recently also decided to reconsider its decision that makes it mandatory for cinema halls to play the national anthem before and after each screening.
Then again there is Aadhaar, which is becoming a knottier affair by the day. The government has been unable to get its act together despite enjoying absolute majority, a privilege not enjoyed by any major party in recent times, in Parliament.
The inability of the government to keep its flock together is also evident from the fact that its policy wonks and other top appointees are quitting the jobs at the drop of a hat. The most recent one to join the line was solicitor general Ranjit Kumar.
The prime minister who headed the previous government was a mild-mannered academic who chose not to be vocal about his plans, which proved to some extent to be that dispensation’s Achilles heel.
The present prime minister, by contrast, is greatly vocal and revels in making elaborate presentations of his government’s initiatives. But he also ensures that besides sharing thoughts, he adds reminders of the incompetence of the previous government to make his point.
It may be a potent ploy to make the achievements of his government look big. But it will not work for long as the fact that the electorate delivered an overwhelming mandate to the ruling dispensation at the last general election was proof enough for the fact that it was unhappy with the way it had been governed.
The onus on the present government is to show what it can do and not to unravel what the former dispensations could not.