Excuse me for being blind to any of Modi’s faults; the cause lies with his detractors, whose gigantic vices cast blanketing shadows over Modi’s. The foot soldiers of the anti-Modi industry have been burning the midnight oil, striving hard to earn their keep. Going by their success past and present, one may say with some confidence that this success has been confined to the USA, and clustered only in the small confines of the academia infested with failed socialists and pseudo-secularists, who, still unconscious of passing time and unable to grasp the zeitgeist, continue to teach wrong theories and bad manners to their students.

The recent drama at the Wharton India Economic Forum (WIEF) calls to mind the cancellation of Subramanian Swamy’s Harvard University summer course assignment. The pattern is straightforward and similar. Hindus who are alleged to have offended Muslims are insulted in the United States of America. It doesn’t matter if they are not proved guilty by any judicial court or if they have been voted to power by Indian citizens. Guantanamo Bay seems to be eschewed by these fascist liberals, because it was run by the Christians. These hypocritical academicians don’t play their dirty tricks with American politicians like George W. Bush or Barack Obama, who combined to kill more innocent Muslims worldwide than in the crusades.

“We are happy to announce that Shri Narendra Modi, Chief Minister of Gujarat will be addressing the conference and talking about the Gujarat growth model and its significance to the country!” [2] Thus ran the WIEF’s Facebook page in the last week of February 2013. The WIEF focuses on business in India, and at the present time there is nobody in India who qualifies as much as Modi to make such an address, that is, if we are talking about development through good business practices. If you were talking about the Congress Gandhi-Nehru type of business practices, they would have called Robert Vadra or Andimuthu Raja, or Sonia Gandhi who inherited the Bofors cash.

After cancellation of the invitation, which is a blot on the character of anybody, student or teacher, the organisers say they “stand by their decision” [3], making absolute fools of themselves. Their squirmy cancelation statement is pathetic: “As a responsible student body within the University of Pennsylvania, we must consider the impact on multiple stakeholders in our ecosystem. Our team felt that the potential polarising reactions from sub-segments of the alumni base, student body, and our supporters, might put Mr. Modi in a compromising position … We as a team would like to apologise for being a catalyst … may have put Mr. Modi and the Wharton School administration in a difficult position.” [4]

A close reading of this statement would make one wonder whether the protesters threatened to unclothe Narendra Modi in public and the organisers believed it. It is anybody’s guess who is holding what “stakes” in this devious “environment”. This line of thinking seems even authentic when one recalls that the organisers earlier (when they invited Modi) actually wanted to “present multiple opinions and ideas to our audiences and supporters across the world” and “constructively contribute to the intellectual milieu for which University of Pennsylvania and The Wharton School stand” [5]. Mind you, just 250 “stakeholder” signatures were enough to persuade the organisers to make total idiots of themselves. They could have at least claimed they were just following their teachers’ orders, they being Hindus and unable to say ‘no’ as per tradition.

The ground reality

In December 2012, 25 members of the US House of Representatives wrote a letter to Hillary Clinton, urging her to “continue to deny visa to Modi … as Mr Modi continues to pursue a potential run for higher office, we believe a change in policy to his request for a visa will only embolden Modi and his government’s efforts to obstruct further investigations and the tandem prosecution that have still to be finished to bring the perpetrators to justice. … India is a thriving democracy, and one that is aspiring to a high standard of leadership and progress. It is disturbing that certain parties in India are considering elevating Modi, despite his tie to these attacks. Allowing him to enter the United States will only serve to abdicate his responsibility for the 2002 human rights abuses.”[6]

Later the same month, “feminist-professor” Martha C. Nussbaum, another pseudo-secular cheerleader for Muslims, proclaimed, “Narendra Modi’s re-election a black mark for Gujarat.” [7] Because, for Nussbaum, Modi is anti-woman and “economic growth is not the best measure of development”. (Isn’t she talking the same old thing the missionaries say in India: “Blessed are the poor.”) If she is alluding to criteria other than economics as the indicator of development in her own country, Gujaratis will also have to legalise alcohol, make an industry of poor animals, convert to a monotheistic faith, amass millions of firearms and numerous nuclear warheads and kill each other worldwide in order to equal her country’s development stage.

If one were to think that the Wharton paper tigers, the ‘feminist-professor’ and the 25 US lawmakers make up world opinion, or reflect the ground reality of our times, one would be barking up the wrong tree. The lawmakers’ letter and Nussbaum’s condemnation of the will of the people of Gujarat actually followed a spate of news in the mainstream media about the UK ending the boycott of Modi. [8]

In 2005 Modi was denied a US visa for “violations of religious freedom” and the UK including some European countries boycotted Modi and Gujarat for a decade. Modi had been a convenient and even necessary scapegoat for the Western alliance’s war plans in Afghanistan and Iraq in order to divert Muslim anger against the warmongers. And what better victim than Modi, the pagan king who apparently dared to challenge a monotheistic alliance of discord.

The ‘Vibrant Gujarat 2013’ (a large-scale biennial conference and trade exhibition) that took place in January saw an animated crowd basking in the glory of the one man the monotheist, pseudo-secular world loves to hate – Narendra Modi. The Economist reported the event thus: “There were 7,000 people in the hall for the opening session, which was probably the largest such audience ever seen in India. Delegates came from some 120 countries, including 225 from Canada, 170 from Japan and around 70 each from America and Britain. The Japanese ambassador said that his country has a “natural win-win relationship” with Gujarat. Ron Somers, the president of the US-India Business Council, said Mr Modi had set a new benchmark and proved that “progress trumps politics”. Sir James Bevan, the British high commissioner, declared himself a “son of Gujarat”— on the grounds that he was born in Leicester, which has the largest expatriate population of Gujaratis.”[9]

In February 2013, British Prime Minister David Cameron expressed his keenness to have Narendra Modi in England in May this year in his official capacity and even told Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of his government’s intentions. [10] The USA will follow suit without much delay, because in the new equation, the foreign business partners need Modi and Gujarat more than the latter need them.

The source constituents of the Modi mania

The anti-Modi industry is a conglomerate comprising, first of all, failed socialists and pseudo-secularists who are still at the helm of university departments, now resting on the laurels of the dubious work they did to procure their seats in the first place. They used to completely monopolise the intellectual space in the fragmented India left behind by the British. But their fear of Modi is as genuine and well founded as their phobia for true scholarship.

Modi symbolises the renaissance of Hindu power that they strove to subvert and for which they sacrificed their empty intellectual lives. Modi’s every step of progress, including electoral and judicial victory, is an encroachment on their psychological space and their Modi mania is justifiable, because they foresee their intellectual achievements invalidated and evaporating in one sweep.

The second constituent is the corrupt politician who still runs the British legacy intact in India – looting the people and shipping the loot abroad. The establishment under Jawaharlal Nehru, who set the trend in this direction, borrowed nepotism generously from Communist fellow travellers, and the ‘divide and rule’ policy from the British and carried on the cultural demolition of India started by the alien monotheists centuries earlier. Nehruvian policy saw to it that every politician and political party in India had to follow this norm in order to be successful.

Narendra Modi broke this self-destructive convention successfully and convincingly. It is an existential threat to the old order of politicians, who are devoid of any ideology other than caste and religious divisions, by which they thrived for decades. Their perceived enemy is not Arvind Kejriwal or his mentor Anna Hazare, but Narendra Modi, justifiably.

The third constituent is the social and cultural misfit who has become an intellectual mercenary for material gains. These people are intelligent and have been working in different spheres such as administration, universities or the judiciary, etc., but have switched to social activism or been nominated to corrupt government committees for more cash and magnanimous perks. Their revenues come either from abroad or from the public exchequer. Their sole activity is to fight against and thwart Hindu empowerment. They speak out only for the Indian minorities – which generally means Muslims and Christians. Their task is to ensure and gain the support and promotion of the Muslims and Christians at the expense of their majority compatriots, the Hindus.

The fourth constituent is the Christian missionary and the Muslim clergyman or their proxies, running social and religious organisations for the promotion of their religions among the Hindu poor, literally following the arrogant mandates in their scriptures. Narendra Modi is the last person they would have as the Prime Minister of India, because they fear they will have to pack their bags and make a graceless departure, or change profession. A small percentage of this constituent consists of religious extremists who feel they will be physically eradicated were Modi to take up the reins of India.

Modi mania makes these people meaner and brings out the socially and politically evil traits they are trying hard to hide. Like the innate fascist tendencies that sporadically surface in currish insults in supposedly liberal academic circles like Harvard and Wharton. Or the deep fear in his opponents that belches catch phrases like “maut ka saudagar”, “snake”, etc. Modi has not been implicated in or found guilty by any judicial court for any of the crimes alleged by this camp. All the same, Modi has become their nemesis by being just Modi, a Hindu leader with a charisma and excellent track record.

Narendra Modi is the only leader of any party in India at this time who could swing the results all by himself. For the common Indian citizen on the street who is optimistic about his or her country, whether Muslim, Christian or Hindu, Dalit or Brahman, the ideal vision of an India beyond religion, caste and sectarianism is invested in Modi. The common man’s bets [11] are on him. Whether the BJP will realise this and capitalise on the common sentiment with the right message and the right coalition partners remains to be seen. But one thing is certain – Modi has unfinished business in the service of his country.

Notes

[1] http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/rahul-kanwal-jamiat-leader-maulana-madani-narendra-modi-seedhi-baat/1/250605.html

[2] http://www.pagalguy.com/news/modi-wharton-war-losses-both-sides-a-29570

[3] http://www.niticentral.com/2013/03/05/dear-wharton-benjamin-franklin-would-have-been-ashamed-of-your-duplicity-52395.html

[4] See note 3.

[5]] See note 3.

[6] http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/continue-denying-visa-to-narendra-modi-us-lawmakers-urge-hillary-clinton-300655

[7] http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-12-24/news/35991670_1_gujarat-chief-minister-gujarat-riots-naroda-patiya

[8] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/22/uk-ends-boycott-narendra-modi

[9] http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2013/01/narendra-modi

[10] http://m.timesofindia.com/india/Narendra-Modi-may-get-UK-visa-in-May-hints-Cameron/articleshow/18602881.cms

[11] http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/NewDelhi/NDA-Narendra-Modi-favourites-if-polls-held-now-Survey/Article1-999422.aspx