Sometime in the next 14 months, India will vote in the next general election. Depending on how BJP and Congress reform, the next PM will...
Sometime in the next 14 months, India will vote in a general election. As things stand, in about 330 Lok Sabha seats, the likely winners will be either a BJP or a Congress candidate. In the rest, it will be a dominant regional party. Depending on how BJP and Congress reform, the next PM will most likely be from one of them (with Modi as the current favourite.)
But elections can throw up surprises as sometimes happen — and the PM could be a from some other coalition. So after the next election, the PM could be Narendra Modi, Rahul Gandhi or someone else. One can assign different probabilities to various scenarios, and that game has begun in earnest. The Prime Minister’s position is the most important in the country. The actions of the PM will determine the future of our nation.
So, it is time to start a discussion on the type of PM that India needs. In the past, most elections have been about voting for specific parties. But elections in recent times are becoming more Presidential in the sense that people are also considering who they want as their leader in Delhi.
Narendra Modi, as the incumbent PM, will be asking voters for a mandate to continue the job. Also likely, Rahul Gandhi will be the challenger and ask voters to demand a change in the country’s leadership. Both parties will have the force of their leaders and their aggressive campaigning. They will have their detailed manifestos.
The BJP will talk about its accomplishments and criticise the Congress for its track record of over 55 years in power since 1947. The Congress will target the BJP for broken promises and the things it has done wrong. Voters will be treated to another gladiatorial winner-take-all contest. Every day some statements will be amplified and distributed via WhatsApp to all of us. And the day will come when we have to choose.
By the time the next elections come, as a nation we would have seen another few years go by – years lost like the previous ones, years of more missed opportunities, years which would have taken us some more steps away from prosperity. When will this cycle stop?
