NEW YOR – India is seeing its freedoms erode under Prime Minister NarendraModi’s “increasingly autocratic rule” as “illiberal” rulers are underminingdemocracy from Poland to the Philippines, according to an opinion piece inan influential American newspaper.
Writing in the Washington Post, author and columnist Max Boot targetedModi, enumerating his high-handed actions and spotlighting some failedpolicies.
Pointing out that Modi was first elected in 2014 on a promise to boostIndia’s economic growth, the author said that his “reforms have been abust”.
Far from accelerating growth to 9 percent or 10 percent, it has fallen to 5percent, the worst performance in six years, Boot wrote under the title‘Narendra Modi is India’s Trump”, referring to the controversial USpresident now facing impeachment hearings.
“Modi hasn’t been hurt politically — he won reelection in a landslide inMay — because he has transitioned from an economic to a nationalistmessage,” and pushing India to become a Hindu theocracy, he said.
“Like other populists, Modi taps into the resentment of impoverished votersleft behind by globalization by directing their anger at elites andminorities. In India’s case, that means the English-speaking elitesassociated with the Congress Party, which barely exists anymore, and the 14percent of Indians who are Muslims, along with smaller numbers ofChristians, Sikhs and other minorities, in a country that is 80 percentHindu,” according to the article.
Boot wrote: “In truth, Hindu nationalism has always been central to Modi’sappeal. In 2005, when he was chief minister of the state of Gujarat, Modiwas banned from entering the United States because he and his party, theBharatiya Janata Party (BJP), were accused of having incited communal riotsagainst Muslims that left more than 1,000 people dead.
Today, as prime minister, he continues to largely turn a blind eye to hatecrimes against Muslims, which have skyrocketed since he took office.
“On Aug. 5, Modi revoked the autonomy of India’s lone Muslim-majority state— Jammu and Kashmir. Half a million Indian security forces then brutallyquashed demonstrations and locked up local leaders. The Internet andtelephone service were cut off, and media prohibited from visiting, to keepthe world from learning what was happening.
“In the state of Assam, next door to Bangladesh, Modi is moving to strip 2million Muslims of their Indian citizenship on the dubious grounds thatthey are undocumented immigrants.
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The state government in Assam is now building vast detention camps to holdthousands of people who are likely to be deported. This could be a preludeto stripping citizenship — and the vote — from millions of Muslimselsewhere in India.
“The judiciary, in India as elsewhere, has traditionally been a bulwark ofliberty, but BJP partisans increasingly dominate the courts. India’sSupreme Court just ruled that a massive Hindu temple could be built in thetown of Ayodhya on the site of a sixteenth-century mosque that was razed byHindu fanatics in 1992.
This has long been a cherished project of Hindu nationalists such as Modiwho are determined to transform India from a secular democracy into a Hindutheocracy.
“One of Modi’s most eloquent critics has been Aatish Taseer, a writer whowas born in Britain (whose citizenship he still holds), grew up in Indiaand now lives in the United States. In May, he wrote an essay in Timemagazine headlined:
“Can the World’s Largest Democracy Endure Another Five Years of a ModiGovernment?” As if to prove Taseer’s concerns correct, the government juststripped him of his Overseas Citizenship of India card — the closest thatthat country has to dual nationality.
“The Indian government has accused Taseer of fraud for not declaring thathis father was a Pakistani citizen. But he tells me that no suchdeclaration was necessary when his single mother, a well-known Indianjournalist who gave birth to him out of wedlock, filled out the form in2000.
In any case, he has not made any secret of his parentage — he has writtenmany essays and books about his father, a Pakistani politician with whom hehad no contact until age 21 and who was assassinated in 2011.
