It was not a political meeting, as Cho Ramaswamy reminded us twice during his 'special address' that lasted less than five minutes. The crowd at the Centenary Auditorium of the University of Madras did not believe him, of course. Arun Shourie followed, speaking about his latest book, and using quotes from that to berate the government for its inaction; the audience was sure that Cho was right, that his was not a political meeting. It was unlike the Arun Shourie that I expected; there he was, firing up the crowd, taking pot-shots at the PM, berating the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence for being dysfunctional and snidely describing its Chairman as "that great geo-strategic thinker - Shri Raj Babbar". He warned us that whatever words Modi used would be dissected for emphasis, setting the crowd up to expect something strong from the man as he came up to speak.
Parts of the crowd chanted the usual slogans, but they scattered and fell to the ground rather quickly. Modi got into his speech - it was in English, and he was reading it out. That was rather disappointing, for he wasn't getting a lot of it right. It was only when he went away from the prepared text and expounded in Hindi that he was most relaxed and at his best. Of course he needled the government. Of course he mocked them. It was nothing new, nothing different from what he has been saying for the past year or so. But because he was saying it at the Nani Palkhivala Memorial Lecture on "India and the World" - not a political meeting - it seemed to be a tad jarring.
We got past that quickly, for every time he made a comment about the present dispensation, he moved into some other idea. There were a few ideas there, ideas that probably sketched out his foreign policy vision, at least for the neighbourhood. The standard line of being tough against intrusion extended into weaving strands of neighbourliness, playing upon common south Asian identities: Buddhism was the thread of choice for the evening. Rhetoric about repelling intrusions across our borders flowed into a somber assessment of cyber-warfare preparedness; and then, very surprisingly, into an charged plea for repelling terrorism through "firewalls of our hearts". It was, as he put it, "Shakti with Shanti"
He spoke about decentralising foreign policy, or at least its visible manifestations. That part was picked up by the print media, but his point was also to use such opportunities to build awareness about various parts of the country, thereby building a gateway to the tourism industry; "Terrorism divides, tourism unities", he repeated. Arun Shourie had indicated that Narendrabhai would be talking about soft power, but not that he would be doing it so softly.
It was not just soft power, but also "healing power". The putative PM-in-waiting talked about easing the world's aches and pains, not merely with medical tourism but also through a greater emphasis on ayurveda and other traditional systems, as well as yoga. He spoke about moving away from emphasis on fossil fuels, to creating a grouping of nations blessed with the sun's healing power, something like an OSPEC, to coin an acronym. His closing exhortation was for everyone to take their job seriously and to do it well.
Simple statements, but they were quite well presented. The contrast with other aspirants was probably the difference between simple and simplistic. Was this lecture significant? I can't help feeling that the media has ignored what seems to be a strategic pivot of the Modi campaign. On the strength of what he said today, there is certainly hope. But that hope needs to be sustained through a more full-bodied version of the policy. In any case, it is certainly better than playing headless chicken!
Parts of the crowd chanted the usual slogans, but they scattered and fell to the ground rather quickly. Modi got into his speech - it was in English, and he was reading it out. That was rather disappointing, for he wasn't getting a lot of it right. It was only when he went away from the prepared text and expounded in Hindi that he was most relaxed and at his best. Of course he needled the government. Of course he mocked them. It was nothing new, nothing different from what he has been saying for the past year or so. But because he was saying it at the Nani Palkhivala Memorial Lecture on "India and the World" - not a political meeting - it seemed to be a tad jarring.
We got past that quickly, for every time he made a comment about the present dispensation, he moved into some other idea. There were a few ideas there, ideas that probably sketched out his foreign policy vision, at least for the neighbourhood. The standard line of being tough against intrusion extended into weaving strands of neighbourliness, playing upon common south Asian identities: Buddhism was the thread of choice for the evening. Rhetoric about repelling intrusions across our borders flowed into a somber assessment of cyber-warfare preparedness; and then, very surprisingly, into an charged plea for repelling terrorism through "firewalls of our hearts". It was, as he put it, "Shakti with Shanti"
He spoke about decentralising foreign policy, or at least its visible manifestations. That part was picked up by the print media, but his point was also to use such opportunities to build awareness about various parts of the country, thereby building a gateway to the tourism industry; "Terrorism divides, tourism unities", he repeated. Arun Shourie had indicated that Narendrabhai would be talking about soft power, but not that he would be doing it so softly.
It was not just soft power, but also "healing power". The putative PM-in-waiting talked about easing the world's aches and pains, not merely with medical tourism but also through a greater emphasis on ayurveda and other traditional systems, as well as yoga. He spoke about moving away from emphasis on fossil fuels, to creating a grouping of nations blessed with the sun's healing power, something like an OSPEC, to coin an acronym. His closing exhortation was for everyone to take their job seriously and to do it well.
Simple statements, but they were quite well presented. The contrast with other aspirants was probably the difference between simple and simplistic. Was this lecture significant? I can't help feeling that the media has ignored what seems to be a strategic pivot of the Modi campaign. On the strength of what he said today, there is certainly hope. But that hope needs to be sustained through a more full-bodied version of the policy. In any case, it is certainly better than playing headless chicken!
