Opinion Express View: The new year needs a new political imagination

A new year calls for a new courage, a renewed political imagination. The 2024 Lok Sabha election mandate paved the way for a break with the same old. The Narendra Modi government came back to power but the voters denied it a majority — their message to it was that it needed to press the refresh button. The Opposition was given a greater voice but not power — the voters were giving it more space for manoeuvre in which to reboot. Six months later, as they step into the new year, both sides need to ask themselves whether they have taken heed of the voters’ unsubtle nudge. Has a government that has entered its third term, despite its reduced numbers and because of them, acknowledged its responsibility to break new ground? Has an Opposition that has climbed out of a long and steep downslide used its hard-won visibility to shore up an alternative more engaging and persuasive? The answer to both these 2024 questions is, unfortunately, no. And therein lies the challenge that 2025 brings.

With its impressive victories in the assembly elections of Haryana and Maharashtra, the second one a comprehensive sweep, the Modi government has the political capital it needs to cushion itself from the short-term blow-backs of the much-needed big moves. And in a year with only two major elections — 2025 will be book-ended by the Delhi and Bihar polls – it has a crucial opening and expanse in which to take its eye off the election calendar. The upcoming budget will be an opportunity it cannot afford to miss to usher in long delayed reforms – on getting government out of business so that it can focus on governance, building knowledge capacities for the future, or on rationalising spending by moving from market-distorting subsidies to cash transfers, and on recognising the limits of cash transfers as stand-ins for enhancing state capacity and delivery. It could be said that with growing pressure on the rupee, with GDP growth slowing down and foreign flows waning, the hard decisions can no longer be deferred. Boldness has arguably been thrust upon the Modi government. It only remains to be seen whether and how it steps up to it. Of course, underlying the economic and governance task will be the fundamental political challenge. Can the Modi-BJP, now a three-time winner, let go of the anger and insecurity that has become for it a source of primal energy? Can it find the confidence and large-heartedness — and the outreach — that can make more credible its claims to “sabka vishwas” in a land of great diversities?

Advertisement

The Opposition’s challenge is, if anything, more arduous. So far, after the Lok Sabha verdict which brought it back into the reckoning, the Congress has shown only a risk-averse return to old slogans on caste and not-so-old spectres featuring the Constitution-in-danger or Adani emblazoned on pieces of clothing. For the rest, its face-off with the BJP reeks of a me-too-ness, most conspicuously in its attempts to out-bid the BJP in the lazy politics of cash transfers. In the new year it must make its own ground, find its feet. Let 2025 be the year of ideas and of the imagination. Happy New Year.