Whenever someone told Modi’s strength is Rahul Gandhi, they were only speaking half the truth. In fact, Narendra Modi’s strength includes Arvind Kejriwal, Mamta Banerjee and so many others in the opposition.
Though he took the nation by surprise by his storming declaration on demonetisation, in all probability prime minister made a sudden announcement even before RBI had fully prepared to deal with the situation. Maybe he sensed some leakage and to prevent people from benefiting he had to announce it all of a sudden. If so, his targets are not from opposition but from his own party. Of course, leaders from BJP are forced to support the move, as the move itself has already connected with the public.
Consider a case of Vajpayee in opposition. How either of them would have reacted to this scenario? Simple. They would have welcomed the decision and lauded the prime minister for his efforts, on the first day. Next day onwards, they would start harping on the problems faced by the public and questioned the government. They would have given notice for a discussion in the Parliament and irrespective of the presence of Prime minister, continued their speeches – even if it was to the empty treasury benches. They knew the value of parliament.
What the current opposition did? Accused Modi of informing BJP leaders in advance. Then accused Modi of taking unilateral decisions even without consulting finance minister. God knows, how he can be accused of both. Everyone from the opposition claimed this act of demonetisation cannot solve the problem of black money. One wise person spoke Modi was simply deviating public glare from his failure in bringing black money from abroad. Voracious ones demanded a roll back of this decision.
For the first two weeks, when each city had witnessed massive queues in front of ATMs and Banks, opposition had some photo op moments by standing in the queues. Rallies were taken out opposing the decision and a call to shut down entire country was given, which was refused by the already suffering public. States like Kerala and Maharashtra had seen opposition parties demanding cooperative banks be allowed to transact like other banks. When they realised this decision is not going to be reversed, everybody calmed down. Few opposition leaders had the intelligence to question the government on the failure – in a proper way. Proper way being questioning only the ‘failure of execution’. One of them was Manmohan Singh and he interpreted the demonetisation as ‘organised loot and legalised plunder’. And no solutions to solve people’s problems or suggestions were given by him.
People like Amartya Sen termed that the government had broken the promise of paying the money to the public. If a Nobel awardee economist interprets ‘people depositing money into their accounts’ as ‘government failing to pay’, how can there be any logical discussion happen?
Of course, Modi’s decision had connected with the public. All metro based TV channels have reported news from – Metros. People in other cities, towns and villages – they don’t exist for them. But, at the ground level, many people are still facing problem. Currency situation in Mumbai is yet to be normalised. Situation in small cities and towns is worse. People with bank accounts have a sort of restricted access to money. Migrant labour living on daily wages are the worst affected, for their contractors don’t have money to pay them and they don’t get any credit where they live!
Access to new currency is still not available in rural areas, affecting the business transactions. For locals, business might be happening on credit basis. Strictly speaking reports of new currency hoarding have proved the lacunae in the implementation. In the Indian administrative scenario, it is easy for every two bit politician and any mighty officer to coerce banking officials to yield to their requests – or demands. And there are some bank officers who are more entrepreneurial than others. Considering about 10% of new 2K notes have fallen into the hands of these people, it amounts to the currency equal to the requirement at rural areas.
Along with the news of two government engineers were caught with four crores in 2K notes in Karnataka, there also came the news of one BJP youth wing leader from Tamilnadu caught with 45 Lacs worth 2K notes. Irony is this man was leading from the front on Modi’s digital push. Already 92.5 Lacs worth old currency that now is illegal was seized from a van belonging to a minister from Maharashtra, where BJP is in rule. And these news only denote the failure of RBI in planning a foolproof mechanism to distribute cash so that it can reach villages.
Worry is there is no one to question the government on the demonetisation execution plan. All we see is from the press release after IT raids and Police seizures.
There is no opposition leader to question the government on how this money deviated from its scheduled path of distribution. Seems all are worried about their own losses and were trying to ‘exchange’ their own truckloads. Even the smog filled Mumbai air is full of rumours that Didi shifted money to secretariat in many trucks that is worth thousands of crores and so wanted Army to stop its scheduled data collection drive! Local trains in Mumbai are more frank than the once famous (or notorious) newshour.
All said and done, though people support demonetisation, they are facing problems – and some of them are genuine and critical. Of course, for collective good, people are willing to accept some collateral damage, but to what extent and for how long? People really believe Modi will solve all problems of currency by the end of current year and the new year will be a happy one. But, the facts on village streets are not too encouraging.
Prime Minister need to take control of the situation and take steps to improve currency availability to rural areas. Bankers may feel temptation to count large sums of money they received (I too would like to count again and again if I get that much money), but it is time stop counting received money and start distributing new currency to people. What to do with the money received or how to go cashless can be handled later.