Pundits smart, Modi smarter

New Delhi: He welled up, he choked and he waxed emotional, more than once in a fortnight - brought to bear by as anodyne a word as demonetisation. For the past 14 days, Narendra Modi has been raining fire, brimstone and tears from the pulpit, returning to a trail the Great Communicator blazed in the summer of 2014 and appearing to connect with many who whiled away hours in queues outside banks in the autumn of 2016. Rural India is said to be in distress, several economists have picked holes in the logic of recalling currency notes, industrialists have expressed dismay in private, traders have mourned the loss of business and acidic jokes are carpet-bombing social media. Still, it's all water off a duck's back on the street. So far, not many citizens queuing up for hours with no certainty that there would be cash at the end of the line are criticising him. In fact, some are openly praising the Prime Minister for "giving it to them", a euphemism for the "dishonest rich". The mood may change if the cash crunch festers and the economic impact eclipses the political pitch but right now Modi seems to be catching the ear of his audience, whether they are in a queue or in a more exclusive environment. On Tuesday, the Prime Minister treated BJP parliamentarians to his tears - once, twice or thrice is a matter of conjecture since the meeting was behind closed doors in the Parliament complex - as he spoke of his devotion to the poor. In Panaji recently, he had come close to tears while recounting how he sacrificed everything for the nation. Modi has painted demonetisation in myriad political hues that seek to tap the BJP's innate belief in hyper-nationalism, burnish his own "pro-poor" credentials and, above all, "prove" he is India's only "legitimate crusader" against corruption. Dilip Cherian, the founding partner of image management firm Perfect Relations, said: "The Prime Minister's message has three parts - the first, make everyone feel guilty about protesting the move. The second, project this as a move targeted at the rich and in the interests of the poor. The third, give the whole thing a veneer of anti-terror which equals pro-nationalism." A government source close to Modi for years claimed that the three parts often worked in tandem. "My security guard is from Bihar. I was startled to hear him tell me that demonetisation is very good because in his village alone, 11 bodies of jawans killed in J&K were returned in the past five years," the source said. Satish Isaac, a Chennai-based communications specialist, interpreted Modi's demonetisation campaign as a "disruption of the traditional branding exercise that we are increasingly seeing from politicians, whether (Arvind) Kejriwal, (Donald) Trump or the PM". Isaac went on to say that the idea of such "disruptive" methods was to regularly create a "vibe" around the protagonist-politician and focus national attention on a subject of the politician's choosing. Yesterday it was the surgical strike, today demonetisation and tomorrow, something else. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's media adviser and author Sanjaya Baru attributed the supposed endurance quotient of the people to a perception that "Indians are often willing to wait and give their leaders time, and that's what appears to be happening here too". BJP general secretary Ram Madhav said what a party official is expected to say: "The PM enjoys the trust of the people like no other PM in the past did. People instinctively trust him as a leader committed to their well-being, as someone who doesn't have any self-interest." Another BJP leader who did not want to be quoted put in perspective what Madhav said, drawing a distinction between Modi's demonetisation gamble and another anti-corruption card P.V. Narasimha Rao had played in the 1990s when he was Prime Minister. Rao had unleashed a drive to nail illegal hawala transactions and swept into the dragnet several formidable leaders of the time such as L.K. Advani (unscathed by graft charges until then), V.C. Shukla, Sharad Yadav and Madan Lal Khurana. But Rao's campaign failed to capture the popular imagination. "Rao obviously did it to brush away the taint left by scandals associated with the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, Lakhubhai Pathak (a pickle king who had claimed he was cheated) and Harshad Mehta (the Big Bull linked to the securities scam). These allegations may have later been disproved but the perception was that Rao was badly tarred. The hawala crackdown was seen as a way of fixing his political rivals and nothing more," the BJP old-timer said. In spite of Opposition attempts to link him to some industrialists and courting controversy by appearing in a monogrammed suit and advertisements of big business, Modi has managed to retain a Teflon-like coating that makes it difficult for charges to stick, the BJP leader pointed out. The leader attributed it to an utter lack of self-doubt or unflinching self-belief and the extreme simplicity of Modi's message - as opposed to the nuanced assessment offered by economists. "When Modi does something, he does not give the impression that he has any misgivings about it. When he says 'the rich are losing sleep and the poor are enjoying a sound sleep' after demonetisation, it is obviously hyperbole. But it connects better than an economist's laboured explanation on how black money is a 'stock' as well as a 'flow' and demonetisation will have only negligible impact," he said. Not everyone is starry-eyed about Modi and his message. An RSS source and a former associate bluntly put it to Modi's "media management skills" rather than "communication savvy". Modi's tactic, the source said, is to "convey the message that 'I am a superhero out to destroy the big black money apparatus. To me, 98 per cent of people are good and the two per cent Vijay Mallyas are bad. Let us vanquish this two per cent. You are good, I am good, let us come together for the greater good'." Baru said Modi's rhetoric may help him for a while. "Things have to improve for ordinary people in the 50 days the PM has sought. Otherwise, his credibility will take a hit, to say the least."