Modi’s desperation for legitimacy may not yield results

If Modi has to legitimize his current regime, he should win the confidence of the opposition, for they can only validate his rule. For now, he seems to have lost the chance. He is attacking the Congress for a past blunder. The worst part of it is that Modi used the office of the Speaker in Lok Sabha to denigrate the main opposition party

The language of the presidential address to Parliament has once again revealed Modi’s desperation for legitimacy. The only problem is his manner and the source he has chosen for it. He is not ready to realize that nothing could compensate for an incomplete electoral mandate. He is trying to manipulate a mandate and seek approval from outside the constitution. In his attempt to stay in power, he is further undermining Indian democracy.

“The world is witnessing that the people of India have elected a stable government with a clear majority, consecutively, for the third term. This has happened after six decades.” President Draupadi Murmu said this in her address in the joint session of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha.

Modi has been repeating this monologue on different platforms since the election results came out. This time, he has used the Presidential Address to Parliament. The cabinet approves the presidential address, and anyone can understand the meaning of this speech. It is the prime duty of the government to maintain the decorum of these offices. How could anyone endorse his using the dignified office of the President to vent his frustration? In reality, his attempts are directed against democracy. It would be naïve on our part to ignore the ideological machinations behind it.

He is trying to impress upon the international community and the people of India that he has not lost the elections. He retained the portfolios of important ministers from his previous cabinet and installed Om Birla in the post of speaker of Lok Sabha for the second time. These are all parts of his exercise to make people think that nothing has changed. In his speeches, he announces a non-existent victory. Is it not strange that instead of accepting the electoral defeat, he is boasting of victory? It is not. His disregarding the mandate aligns with his ideological stance, the ideology of the RSS. This ideology does not believe in accepting the wishes of the people. It believes in imposing its will on the people. Is it not just the opposite of what democracy mandates?

The manner in which BJP supporters started to ridicule the people of Ayodhya for electing socialist Dalit leader Awadesh Prasad reveals the very nature of the saffron ideology. Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi have rightly acknowledged the contribution of the Dalit leader to the defeat of the communal narrative built around the Sri Ram temple. He shares a seat with them in the front row facing the Prime Minister's seat. It must be most frustrating for Modi and his supporters.

The question is whether the Prime Minister would be able to manipulate the mandate for the entire term of the Lok Sabha. Could he be able to convince the people that he is the real winner by engineering support from parties such as the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the Janata Dal-United (JDU)? He has brought back Om Birla as the speaker to silence the opposition members and endorse every single act of the government.

It is one thing: claiming a fictitious victory is another crushing dissent. He has indicated that he would continue with what he has been doing with the opposition during his past 10-year rule. Speaker Birla also looks keen to repeat his disregard for the opposition. One of his videos reprimanding a Congress MP went viral on social media. The MP is seen receiving rude and unkind treatment from him. The lawmakers rightly recalled in their speeches on the occasion of the installation of the Speaker how he had expelled a significant number of MPs during the last session.

We need to examine Modi’s attempt to bring legitimacy from the exterior. He is trying to snatch legitimacy from his party and its parent organization, the RSS; he is trying to get endorsement from a compliant media; and he is trying to bring support from institutions such as the Election Commission of India, the Chairs in Parliament, and the President of India. Could these institutions grant the required legitimacy when their actions are questionable? There was no meeting of the BJP Parliamentary Party to elect Modi as the leader, yet the President invited him to form the government. She did not come out with a communique to explain why she selected a leader from the party that did not have a majority in the Lok Sabha. Her predecessors, such as Venkatraman and K.R. Narayanan, had done it.

If Modi has to legitimize his current regime, he should win the confidence of the opposition, for they can only validate his rule. For now, he seems to have lost the chance. He is attacking the Congress for a past blunder. The worst part of it is that Modi used the office of the Speaker in Lok Sabha to denigrate the main opposition party. The incident of the Chair's bringing a resolution to condemn the emergency rule in 1975 does not behove his office.

The saffron attack on the Congress for emergency rule some fifty years ago might help create an untimely narrative, but it would not help the BJP. However, it would bring to light the fact that the RSS supporters had bowed down before late Prime Minister Gandhi to get the ban lifted on the RSS. It is also known that Mrs. Gandhi realized the folly and humbly accepted the public verdict. The Congress did not repeal all those laws that were introduced by the Janata Party to prevent any repeat of such actions in the future. The Congress had enough members both in 1980 and 1984 to do it. It would also be relevant to remind people that the Congress ruled for almost two decades soon after their debacle in 1977. It is a matter of speculation what would have happened if Modi had gotten such a mandate!

(The author is a senior journalist. He has experience of working with leading newspapers and electronic media including Deccan Herald, Sunday Guardian, Navbharat Times and Dainik Bhaskar. He writes on politics, society, environment and economy)