Back to the Gujarat Model

The results of the 2014 Lok Sabha polls were out. Narendra Modi had won a historic majority powered by a mandate for change. As he prepared to move to New Delhi where new responsibilities awaited him, Modi asked his team to prepare a report card of his tenure as Gujarat’s chief minister. Before leaving the state, he told his aides, he needed to provide an account of what had been done for it and to thank voters for their support that saw him win three successive elections as chief minister. The consequence was a detailed presentation that set out the constituents of the ‘Gujarat Model’, the template that formed the basis of Modi’s formidable reputation as an able administrator and saw him capture the imagination of voters seeking an alternative to the corruption scandals and high inflation that had marred the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance’s (UPA) second term in office.

Gujarat’s success in achieving no-loadshedding status by 2014 looks all the more remarkable when compared to most other states still struggling to deliver 24×7 three-phase power more than eight years after Modi moved to the Centre. Despite significant improvements, even smaller states like Haryana have not been able to deliver reliable electricity or implement smart grid projects for select cities. Gujarat’s Jyotigram Yojana led to a mushrooming of businesses like ice-cream parlours and cold-food chains while dramatically reducing dependence on pollution-causing diesel gensets that are a ubiquitous presence in Indian cities. Migration from rural Gujarat dipped 33 per cent as did the dropout rate for girl students which fell by 80 per cent. The average time spent by school students studying at home rose sharply. The foundation for the scheme rested on a massive effort to separate feeders (transmission lines) for agriculture and domestic use, an exercise that saw more than 78,000 km of power cables installed. Apart from improving the lives of homesteads, the growth in agricultural processing was evident even as the commissioning of the Narmada dam and its waterworks increased the area under farming in the state.

Modi’s 13 years as chief minister saw increased power consumption, a near-tripling of road length, a growth rate higher than the national average along with a rising contribution to India’s GDP, and a lower state debt that fell by more than 10 per cent. On the social welfare indices, Gujarat’s below poverty level (BPL) population fell to 16.6 per cent from 31.6 per cent in 2004-05; the maternal mortality rate improved to 122 per 1,000 live births in 2010-12 from 202 in 2001-02; infant mortality fell 36 per cent between 2001 and 2012 while the literacy rate grew 10 per cent from 2001 to 2011. Yet, despite the decreased malnutrition levels and higher number of institutional deliveries, the campaign for the 2014 election had been marked by a concerted attack on Gujarat’s economic and social sector performance, with critics and ideological opponents arguing that the state was only “middle ranking” when it came to a comparison with other states. The criticism was often selective, with commentators ignoring Gujarat’s rate of improvement. For a state with a large tribal population and suffering from social deficits in education and health, Gujarat had climbed out of the bottom half of rankings with remarkable success. Keenly aware that Modi was getting the attention of the middle class—disenchanted by UPA’s record of scandals and poor economic management—as well as the less privileged who saw him as a leader who had experienced the pain of poverty, Congress aggressively targeted the state’s record. In the context of the 2002 riots, the Gujarat model was labelled as majoritarian and a laboratory for Hindutva. There was certainly a politico-cultural element to Modi’s policies but one that also saw BJP emphasise the drop in endemic communal violence after the 2002 conflagration.

The Gujarat model became an ideological dividing line, with Modi’s opponents giving it a derisive connotation as they attacked BJP for promoting a polarising agenda while questioning its material benefits. The problem with the strategy was that stories of Gujarat’s success were carried home by migrants from other states who worked in cities like Surat, Ahmedabad and Vadodara. The obvious improvements in infrastructure and the state’s ability to provide livelihoods stood in contrast to the stasis that gripped states where caste and community mobilisation remained the mainstay for ruling parties. Modi’s unapologetic advocacy of a Hindu cultural identity and the force of his personality posed a serious challenge to UPA and Congress leaders, well aware of the threat, looked at the possibility of fresh charges relating to the Ishrat Jahan and Sohrabuddin encounter cases to somehow hamstring the BJP mascot. The legal challenges failed to pass muster in the courts and the fading appeal of the rights-based policies, such as the right to education and work as well as farm loan write-offs that yielded UPA handsome returns in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, led to BJP’s return to the centrestage.

Modi’s 13 years as chief minister saw increased power consumption, a tripling of road length, a growth rate higher than the national average. Gujarat’s BPL population fell to 16.6 per cent from 31.6 per cent; maternal mortality improved to 122 per 1,000 live births from 202; infant mortality fell 36 per cent while the literacy rate grew 10 per cent

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After Modi’s move from Gujarat to the Centre, BJP was severely tested in the 2017 election when a slackening in governance, the Patidar agitation and disruptions caused by demonetisation and the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) came together to become what could have been a perfect storm. Having survived the challenge, the Gujarat model has become more entrenched not just in the state but as a governance approach elsewhere too. After his shift to the Centre, Modi adopted his economic and social mantra on an even bigger scale. National schemes aimed at improving sanitation, immunisation, financial inclusion, modernising agriculture markets, cleaning up public-sector banks’ non-performing assets (NPAs), and making bankruptcy laws effective were all guided by a saturation approach. The idea was to achieve 100 per cent coverage for development and social welfare schemes and bring about a drastic overhaul of economic policies.

If the 2014 Lok Sabha election saw a heated and polarising debate on the Gujarat model, the policies pursued by the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) served to entrench it on a national scale. The 2019 election was, in many ways, another referendum on the development-plus-Hindutva model that BJP banked on to woo voters and counter the Mandal parties in north India. The further validation provided by a second consecutive majority has been replicated in states where BJP is in office, the more obvious examples being Uttar Pradesh (UP) and Assam. Both states are helmed by energetic leaders who follow a vigorous law-and-order strategy. They have sanctioned armed encounters to deal with criminals and used tough laws like the National Security Act and the Uttar Pradesh Gangsters and Anti-Social Activities (Prevention) Act against lawbreakers. Their policies have drawn the criticism of human rights activists and have been challenged in court but found popular support. In states where political-criminal gangs have ruled the roost, visible action against wrongdoers has signalled the change in regime. There is little doubt that in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls whereby Modi will seek a third successive term—unprecedented for a non-Congress prime minister—the central issue is going to be his leadership and the Gujarat model which has now been replicated on a national scale.

IN THE EIGHT YEARS that he has been in office, Modi has greatly expanded the scope of his governance model even if infrastructure, a close mapping of people’s requirements, effective law enforcement, modern agriculture, and a focus on health and education, with a special emphasis on tribals and Dalits, remain its building blocks. Since he became prime minister, Modi has strongly leveraged the use of technology to deliver public services and his interventions can be seen in the development of platforms like CoWIN whereby he insisted that a digital-driven strategy was the only way to deliver and monitor India’s anti-Covid vaccination programme. Similarly, his directions were crucial in ensuring that forms for enrolling beneficiaries for Jan Dhan bank accounts were just one-page, seeking basic details, a decision that reduced the workload of bank officials and removed barriers for those wishing to be enrolled. There is a significant step-up of technological interventions by way of the new logistics policy and the integration of planning at the Central and state levels through the Gati Shakti initiative that seeks to de-silo government functioning. The impending rollout of 5G services is expected to quicken business processes and provide a boost to sectors like web-streaming content and animation. At the same time, the Centre continues to focus on ‘pro-poor’ programmes like housing, rural roads, subsidised food and health cover through Ayushman Bharat. The initiative to create digital health identities to access and share health records is another step in this direction. The use of technology backbones is essential to implementing Modi’s call to Central departments to ensure 100 per cent coverage of welfare schemes. This, matched by an unapologetic advancement of ‘nationalist’ political icons and a sharp criticism of India’s Nehruvian past, provides grist for BJP’s culture war with its adversaries. There is little doubt, say officials who have worked with the prime minister, that a mix of development and emotive issues will remain the basis of BJP’s 2024 campaign. “The prime minister is very focused on his goals and his capacity for hard work is remarkable,” said a senior Cabinet minister.

Much of the criticism of the Gujarat model has centred on arguments that the state’s development has been uneven and unequal, and disadvantages the tribal population. During his tenure as chief minister, Modi was keenly aware of the development lag affecting the state’s large tribal population and also that this was an area of weakness for BJP. He often asked young professionals who met him to carry out surveys and studies relating to access to housing, education, health and infrastructure in these areas that supplemented the feedback from the official machinery. His aides said that Modi’s own wide travels in Gujarat gave him firsthand knowledge of regional needs and inequities and he focused on programmes to deliver sanitation, safe drinking water and housing to tribal areas after he became chief minister. According to data from the National Family Health Survey, 2019-21, access to toilet facilities ranges from 62 per cent for tribal households to 95 per cent for general castes in the state. Pre-school attendance, while highest for general or forward castes, is better for tribal households as compared to Scheduled Castes (SC) and backward classes and they had better access to financial assistance for new mothers as well, according to the Gujarat State Report NFHS 5, 2019-21 brought out by the International Institute for Population Sciences in Mumbai. Similarly, coverage of basic vaccinations for tribal children at 80 per cent is higher than other caste groups. While it is evident that tribal and SC communities continue to need more support, there has been an improvement in their status. After he became prime minister, Modi has regularly visited and inaugurated welfare schemes in Gujarat’s tribal belt. More recently, he addressed an event to honour Bhil tribals who died in an insurrection against the British in 1913 at Mangarh Dham in Rajasthan’s Banswara district near the Gujarat border where he shared the stage with Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot. A governance and cultural outreach to tribal communities ranks high on Modi’s agenda and is in sync with BJP-Sangh’s efforts to assimilate them within the Hindu fold.

Though Gujarat’s development indicators remain subject to conflicting claims, the state’s unemployment rate has been among the lowest. The latest Periodic Labour Force Survey for April-June 2022, shows it was 7 per cent in the 15-29 age group. Employment in secondary and tertiary sectors is higher than in agriculture. Gujarat’s better economic performance has provided more avenues for the youth although this may have led to higher aspiration levels that are not easily satisfied. But at the state and national levels, a politically viable alternative to the Gujarat model is currently missing. Pundits sometimes turn to the TINA (there is no alternative) mantra to explain BJP’s success. But unhappy voters seldom vote poor performers back to office (in Punjab they chose newbie Aam Aadmi Party). In Modi’s case, it is as much the ‘pull factor’ of his leadership and policies as the failures of his opponents.

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Rajeev Deshpande

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