Bespoke for the Boss

Three designers play with textiles, silhouettes and colour to dress up Narendra Modi for every occasion

At Raisina Hill that morning, the male dress form stood solemn and solitary, dressed in a grey silk shirt and trousers. A hand-woven tailored jacket in different hues stood out against the grey skies and red sandstone of South Block. In the distance, Parliament House looked like a circus of columns. It had started to drizzle. Gaurav Jai Gupta, a Delhi-based designer who owns the label Akaaro, was trying to explain why he would like to dress Narendra Modi, the BJP leader. A minimalist, he says history must not overwhelm one. It is the future that matters. After all, fashion is about choice. It is also about communication. Which is true of politics as well.

“It is a dream to dress up the powerful,” he says.

The designer’s change of heart didn’t happen in an instant. He wasn’t sure that he liked Modi, but says he thought through all the arguments and came to the conclusion that Modi was an interesting personality to design clothes for.

“Modi has a fashion quotient to him, and that’s why you would like to do something for him. After Indira Gandhi, he is the first politician whose clothes are being discussed. There is something enigmatic about him. He went for the churidar and kurta, but he is stereotyping himself. As a designer, you like to think ‘what if’ and that’s where it starts to become interesting,” says Gupta.

“I think he is fond of his watches and pens, and wears tailored suits,” adds the designer, “Modi is aware of what looks good on him and that works in his favour. The fact that he wears a certain type of watch is proof of his careful selection. And fashion is about choice.” He makes a reference to Jade Blue, the Ahmedabad makers of the famous Modi Kurta. Bipin Chauhan, the outlet’s tailor who has been stitching Modi’s clothes, had once said Modi did not compromise on three things—eyes, voice and clothes. To Gupta, that’s reassuring; it signals a shift away from the white-on-khaki ‘political uniform’ that RSS-affiliated politicians have worn over the years.

“Look at his body language. He is spontaneous. He is street smart. If you look at Manmohan Singh, he has an organic feel to him. Folded hands, slow hands, and slow talk. AAP’s Arvind Kejriwal also has a certain presence of mind, and if you look at his get-up, he is always about branding. He has a formula. But Narendra Modi is the only one who can be with the farmer and the corporate [type],” he says.

The grey silk shirt and trousers that he has picked with the handwoven jacket is something he’d advise Modi to wear at an international conference. It speaks of fusion and conveys a certain idea of being global. His two outfits—the other being a pin-tuck kurta paired with mustard-pleated baggy trousers and a Nehru jacket with gold and red cascading down in blocks—are not standardised looks.

“Since it is a hypothetical situation of dressing, you can play around. You also keep it safe and very measured,” he says. “It is today’s Indian body of work. A lot of people think that the only person who can revive textiles is Modi. Being from Gujarat, this is an interesting context. The state is a textile hub. All that symbolism is there when you look at him. He was a pracharak, so he is disciplined. He has a good posture. He comes across as strong and confident. There is that element of crispness, and someone like that can carry off clothes in a nice way. So, he can combine the Western silhouette, the modern and the contemporary. He is someone who seems like he is up-to-date and completely in tune with technology,” Gupta says.

The designer has used a handwoven textile for the jacket, and that is to signal a pride in Indian craftsmanship—fused with what the world is about. “In politics, things are suggestive. I have given him a very understated look, so there’s austerity. These are very earthy colours. The first look is for travelling… it is evolved and classic, intelligent and sombre. The second one is quite playful.”

The other designer who specialises in menswear, loves discussing politics, offers arguments against the welfare state, and outlines why he thinks Narendra Modi may be his muse, is Suket Dhir. He mixes history and folklore in his designs to connect. For Modi, he picks a block-print mammal shirt with parrot motifs, and a toned-down cherry-colour Nehru jacket with purple linen pants for a casual look. There’s a pocket square for majesty and distinction. And yet, the look is universal. He feels Modi can be a revivalist force in the crafts sector. He can redeem it. It is a luxury to wear fine cotton, and Modi exudes a certain sense of indigenous ‘luxury’.

“This look is political chic,” says Dhir, explaining his choice, “It’s got a bit of a quirk. It shows the lighter side of the politician. The parrot print goes back to our folktales, as documented in our folktales and folk drawings, and then there is the khadi linen Nehru jacket, and the pants. It has a colourful twist. Modi does wear colourful stuff. It is slightly more toned down. It is a [slightly] serious take on his colourful dressing.”

Dhir believes that politicians should not wear crude cotton just for the sake of signalling austerity. The second look he picks is a 500-count cotton dhoti. No gold borders. Just plain white, and six yards of it. That has a context too.

“In the old days, the yards were used as a distinction of class. Six-yard dhotis were meant for the elite. For a man, the dhoti is one of the most elegant garments. It is purely aesthetic. The dhoti is woven in Islampur in Murshidabad in West Bengal. It’s original Dhaka malmal (muslin). Each square inch has 500 threads of cotton. This is a very high count, difficult for any machine-made fabric to achieve. It is done by hand, so imagine the level of craftsmanship. Its retail price can go up to Rs 4,000 per metre length. It is simple, and looks regal. Emperors and kings wore the six-yard dhoti,” he says.

He has paired the dhoti with a green jacket in Bhagalpuri silk with an orange lining. The look, he says, is called ‘Malgudi Days’.

“Bauji [in RK Narayan’s Malgudi Days] used to wear a jacket with his dhoti,” he says. “This could be worn at the time of the speech to the nation on 15 August from the Red Fort. Against the backdrop of the saffrony Red Fort, it kind of brings in India’s national colours—the whites and the green, giving it an Indian picture. Modi has a strong personality of his own. I started looking at him two-and-a-half years ago, when much of the stuff in the media was anti-Modi. Only recently did I see a different discourse. That made me think, and it also inspired me. I didn’t want to consider 2002. I wanted my country to become stronger. Modi is not scared of luxury. He is not shy of indulging himself.”

At the Red Fort, the green stands out. There is a glint of silken luxury too. The dhoti, in itself, speaks of volume. “He is only experimenting with the churidar and kurta. A normal dhoti would do the trick for him,” he says. “The parrot print, he can wear if he is invited to a literary festival, or is travelling to villages, and people will be proud of the fact that he is wearing what they have created. It is not a traditional Indian print, but it [speaks of] ideas beyond the mundane motifs. It signals a coming of age.”

It is more in the texture of this Nehru jacket in green Ajrakh, than in its look, that its luxury is felt. The 60 processes that it has been through has made this a special fabric, one that your fingers can tell apart. It’s all in the journey of the fabric, says Divyam Mehta, a menswear designer known for his craftsmanship who believes in combining diverse cultures to create what he sees as an authentic Indian style statement.

The male form—a sort of full-body outfit hanger—has been set up outside the BJP’s Delhi headquarters. It has a yellow Banarasi cotton silk kurta with crinkled sleeves, and a silk-stitched dhoti, paired with the green raw silk Nehru jacket with gold buttons fashioned in Rajasthan. The hoarding in the background has Modi’s face—smiling.

The idea of politics, Mehta says, is to combine and fuse. It is about diversity, and that’s the spirit in which he has put together the look. “We are presenting bits of different cultures. The idea is to bring [them] together,” he says. “We get textiles from Gujarat. The Ajrakh print is from Bhuj. The idea is to use it in a different context. The green Nehru jacket is more of a texture thing. We used it on raw silk sourced from Bangalore. Then, we have Banarasi cotton that is used for the dhoti and kurta, and it is cotton silk. And then, the handcrafted pocket square is from Bengal. I would like to see politicians mix crafts and cultures. These pieces can be used in many more contexts.”

While this look that Mehta has assembled is something of a daily outfit, the second one he has put together for Modi is rather more luxurious—even experimental in the way it uses colours and fabrics.

Since the official residence of India’s Prime Minister is located on Delhi’s Race Course Road, this is where we shoot Mehta’s second look.

It is a navy malmal kurta paired with khadi denim pants, and a handmade khaki denim Nehru jacket with faded silver buttons and a kantha (embroidery) pocket square in silk. A hint of luxury and a touch of the unique and aristocratic. But nothing overstated. Only hints. “That’s enough,” he says.

“The second look is more contemporary,” he says, “It is handwoven khadi denim, and mixed with khadi cotton from West Bengal. The pocket square is kantha work from Kashmir. While the first look is more traditional, and more tailored, the second is casual. India is rich [in terms of textiles and processes] and I want to use that potential. We have these. We need to place it in a different context.”

At the end, it is about Indianness. And pride in the country’s talent and ability. “We should be proud of it,” says Mehta, “Modi looks like he is proud of what he is, who he is, and what he represents.” A leader who is aware of his look and what it conveys. “As far as I know, Modi is a very fit man. He wants to make decisions and take things forward. It shows in how he dresses: sharp and fitted.” While the BJP leader’s kurtas do add a dash of colour to dull afternoons on grey roads, he adds, the point is to enliven politics. Which is what Modi’s promise is.

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