Modi attacks Indira Gandhi's authoritarianism

Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi criticised the “authoritarianism” and “overconfidence” of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in a blog post on Saturday – observed as national voters’ day.

Updated on: Jan 26, 2014, 09:26:33 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi criticised the “authoritarianism” and “overconfidence” of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in a blog post on Saturday – observed as national voters’ day.

Asking people not to underestimate the value of their votes, the BJP prime ministerial candidate cited the 1977 Lok Sabha elections.

“Intoxicated with power, overconfidence and authoritarianism, the ruling party and the Prime Minister declared elections,” wrote Modi.

“Censorship was near complete and dissenting voices were silenced but when the people spoke they spoke louder than everything else. This is the power of your vote.”

January 25 is celebrated as the foundation day of the Election Commission of India, which was set up in 1951.
Raising awareness about the importance of voting is the norm on national voters’ day. But Modi’s blog and newspaper advertisement sounded more like electioneering, even though he exhorted the public to exercise its franchise.

“Our nation is at a very crucial crossroads – now it is time to free our country from shackles of poverty, corruption, vote-bank politics and misgovernance,” Modi wrote in his blog.

While most election officers said there was nothing wrong on Modi issuing an advertisement on the day, a senior election commission functionary said Modi could have avoided the political references.

“Asking people to register as voters without giving them reasons for the same would have been better,” said the official on condition of anonymity.

Former chief election commissioner TS Krishnamurthy said it was for an audit to determine whether Modi had used government money for the advertisement.

“If the BJP had issued the advertisement, there is nothing objectionable,” he said.

In his blog, Modi also praised the election commission for its “extremely proactive” role in increasing voter registration across the country.

However, he said the time duration between a person submitting the voter registration form and getting the voter card should be shortened. Modi also suggested that citizens be kept updated on the status of their applications.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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