Narendra Modi : Saving Or Destroying India ?

While Narendra Modi is travelling around the world boosting his image with Donald Trump, with Europe, China, Saudi Arabia and other countries I believe there is some 'smoke and mirrors' going on with Modi's rule. Smoke and mirrors means "the obscuring or embellishing of the truth of a situation with misleading or irrelevant information."

To give you a gist lets hear it from some Indians themselves.  Here is a short speech delivered  by Mr Prashant Bhushan, Senior Advocate of the Supreme Court of India at Oxford Union Society. He explained about Narendra Modi. The Indian print and visual media has completely blacked out this speech. 

Things are not what they seem to be in India under the Hindu extremist BJP and Narendra Modi. 

The question to ask is 'What is Modi's desired end? What is his end game?'

To understand this we have to look at Modi's own personal history and what were his convictions. The answer is quite scary. 

I would place Modi in the same class as that Indian goat who is now living here in Malaysia under Dr Mahathir's protection. I believe they both suffer the same psychosis.  It is just that they belong to different religions.  For both of them their versions of religion seems to be their end game. 

Indeed Modi recently was re-elected to another five years with a huge majority. For the first time in decades the Indian government was formed without the need for a coalition government. 

Despite his re-election, Modi's first five years in government have caused some major upheavals in Indian society and in the Indian economy whose resuklts are now becoming more manifest.

Here is some Indian news  :

Amravati, India - increasing female farmers committing suicide in Maharashtra 

agrarian crisis driven more than 30,000 farmers to end their lives
in Amravati district since 2018, 22 female farmers suicide 

activists believe situation is far worse 
Indian govt withholds data 
Maharashtra farmers' suicides doubled to 11,995 in 4 years

till 2015 Indian govt used to publish annual farmer suicides 
last four years, Modi govt has blocked release 
govt publicly said does not maintain this data any more

actual number of female farmer suicides increasing 
trend represents a grim turn
This is a new trend that has taken shape

India's agrarian crisis

more than 180,000 farmers suicide over 20 years

Modi's BJP  went to polls 

agrarian distress absent from campaign narrative

dominated by nationalism and muscular attitude towards Pakistan

Not only farmers but business tycoons and industrialists are also committing suicide in India.  These suicides are being caused by debt, poor business conditions and overzealous taxation.   Here are three cases of renowned businessmen committing suicide :














The last story above is about a guy by the name of Omprakash whose entire family (his father, mother, pregnant wife and another child) were part of his suicide pact. He shot them one by one and then shot himself as well. His business was piled with debt and suffering poor business conditions. 

The other thing that is happening in India even as you are reading this is that a number of banks have collapsed. 

I read that long article. The Reserve Bank of India (the Indian Central Bank) has become very lapse in monitoring Indian banks. From before the time of Narendra Modi  the Indian banks have become overexposed to "big borrowers'.  Then when Modi appeared and imposed his disastrous demonetisation and 18% GST taxes, it killed the Indian businesses.  When the businesses suffered - leading to all those suicides - the banks that were 'over exposed' to large borrowers also collapsed.

Overexposed to large borrowers means up to 40% or even 50% of a banks entire capital funds were loaned out to (or were borrowed by) one large business conglomerate.

(Imagine XXXXbank Berhad has say RM100 billion in capital funds and say 50% of that amount or RM50 Billion is loaned out to just one group, the S_ _d M_ _ _ _r group companies. That is very risky banking.)

Not all the wealthy in India have committed suicide though. Here is a video about India's super rich who have defaulted with the banks. They live in luxury but the banks are collapsing:

Now here is a quick gist of some critique of Narendra Modi's economic policies. 

1. Demonetisation

India’s economic growth not recovered to high levels of early 2000s 
One important reason due to Modi's demonetisation policy
On Nov 8 2016, Modi banned old 500 and 1000 rupee notes 
announcing new 500 and 2,000 rupee banknotes 

aim was to deal death blow to black economy 
Instead policy led to contraction of Indian economy
economic growth slowed to four-year low in 2018 

• by 2018, 99% of old 500 and 1000 rupee notes deposited with banking system
• meaning large proportion of 500 and 1000 rupee notes were not black money
• Thus, demonetisation led to a large economic loss 
• without reducing black economy or corruption
  

2. Goods and services tax (GST)

Modi's (GST) in July 2017
effect of GST negative on economy
especially for India’s large informal sector 
which employs vast majority of people 

implementation of GST not handled well 
small businesses confused about onerous requirements
placed huge compliance burden on them

demonetisation and “hasty implementation of GST" blunder

severely affect micro, small, medium enterprises

causing “loss of tens of thousands of jobs” 

Modi did not pass lower crude oil prices to consumers

petrol, diesel prices historic high in India 

since 2014, oil prices declined to 67%

petrol / diesel in India average increase 110% 

Modi chose to levy excessive excise taxes on petrol / diesel

Instead of passing benefits of low prices to the people

Modi has punished the people

3. Jobs

most disappointing feature of Modi is lack of success in creating jobs 
Unemployment rose to 45-year high, according to leaked report 

Modi weak record in job creation particularly surprising
because Modi launched much-heralded Make in India programme

India’s manufacturing malaise run deep
India’s inability to foster industrialisation like China and other Asian countries

low skill levels among India’s workers
poor infrastructure 
India’s antiquated labour laws
Modi made little headway in providing jobs 

My conclusion : 

My view is Modi is exhausting his earlier popularity and his personal aura as a humble, personally not corrupt and (most importantly) staunchly Hindu nationalist leader. 

It is true that during his recent re-election campaign the BJP played up the Pakistan and religious card very well. They downplayed the massive problems caused by Modi's demonetisation and GST policies.

Overnite India was shocked by a GST tax that went up to 18% - 20% on some consumer goods (luxury goods sector).  It effectively killed off India's substantial middle class purchasing power which also had a negative trickle down effect on the rest of the economy.

Bottom line how is the Indian economy doing now? 
Lets hear from the experts :

International rating agencies predict Indian economy on downward slope 
Moody’s latest to cut India's rating outlook to negative
associated with shadow banking or non-banking financial companies (NBFC) 
drop in GDP growth to 5% also reason for downgrade

India's growth slowdown
prolonged financial stress among rural households
weak job creation
credit crunch among non-bank financial institutions 
increased more entrenched slowdown, Moody's said

So what are Modi and the BJP doing about this? 

I think their ego prevents them from admitting their mistakes.

And they seem to be playing up the religious jingoism.