Independence Day is the day when the nation takes stock of its course since it gained freedom from foreign rule and started shaping its own destiny. The nation was founded on the best and loftiest ideals of democracy and equality and fraternity among people. The journey through more than seven decades has been challenging, and there was much progress and some setbacks. The country is the most populous in the world, has the fifth largest economy, and has a place and voice at the world’s high table. It is the founding fathers’ vision and the efforts of people, represented by governments, organisations and other agencies through all these years, that has taken the country to its present position. Stocktaking is an attempt to evaluate the past, but the occasion also gives an opportunity to imagine the future and to commit ourselves to it.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi presented his vision of the country in his 10th Independence Day address, and talked about the next five years of the country, the next 25 years, and even the next 1,000 years, over which he thought the impact of his decisions would last. While he talked about the longer time spans, an unwise thing to do, especially in a time of rapid changes, the real time span he was most concerned with, as can be discerned from the ideas and themes in his speech, was the next one year when he will seek re-election for a third term. The Prime Minister made a very political speech, with an electoral pitch that took off from his speech in parliament last week. He gave a clear indication of the themes for the coming election when he attacked the Opposition for “corruption, dynastic politics, and appeasement”, and called for strengthening “probity, transparency and impartiality.” He also tried to present a rosy picture of the changes in the country over the past nine years and claimed credit for it.
A political, electorally motivated speech was inappropriate as the I-Day speech. And it became even more so with the Prime Minister referring to himself in the third person and making the country’s progress all about himself – “Modi’s guarantee”, “Modi has been fighting…”, etc. It was a speech of exaggerations, evasions and high-pitched rhetoric. Manipur cannot be claimed to be at peace; the communal fire in Haryana cannot be ignored, nor the official sanction that hate in speech and actions seem to receive across the country. There is still abject poverty, deprivation, inequality and distress in large parts of the country. Its high institutions, as well as citizens’ freedoms and rights, are under relentless challenge. The Prime Minister should not have ignored these realities in his I-Day speech.