Naidu, Nitish Ignore the Pain of All Those Who Have Suffered During Modi’s 10-Year Tenure

It’s all the more striking that Chandrababu Naidu and Nitish Kumar have run to be alongside Narendra Modi as he prepares once again to step into the role of the prime minister after describing the country’s largest minority group as “infiltrators”.

Anand Sahay

It is noteworthy that two leading political figures — the resurrected Andhra Pradesh chief minister-designate N. Chandrababu Naidu and Bihar’s political acrobat Nitish Kumar who finds it difficult to rid himself of the shackles of the chief minister’s office — had to rescue a beleaguered prime ministerial aspirant after he lost the mandate of the people.

In effect, the two leaders are covering for the handicap imposed on Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi by the people of the country for his ten-year run that may be aptly described as a period of misdeeds and a time of terror when Gestapo methods were not deemed unthinkable if you came from the lower rungs of society, or were a member of the largest religious minority, or were a dissident or sat in the Opposition.

It’s all the more striking that Naidu and Kumar have run to be alongside Modi as he prepares once again to step into the role of the prime minister after describing the country’s largest minority group as “infiltrators”. Modi had not become the prime minister after discharging a fusillade of vile rhetoric in 2014 and 2019 — in fact the opposite. It is not surprising that he was demonstrably defeated in 2024 when he spewed communal poison right through the campaign trail. And yet Naidu and Kumar believe they are serving the ends of democracy by lining up with him.

This is truly an extraordinary event in the phase of our political journey when people, parties and social organisations of various shades, overcoming their ideological differences and overlooking even mutual political discomfiture, gathered under the umbrella of the INDIA grouping to challenge the country’s slide toward dictatorship, if not outright fascism overseen by big capital and single-religion nationalism.

For some time now, Kumar has shown himself to be a defeated leader with a giant-sized ego, burning ambition, limited political capital confined to specific constituencies, and next to no chance of leaving his impress unaided. He has been holding on to his crutches for a considerable time. For the past six months, he has been with Modi, swallowing past insults. Therefore, it was not a surprise to see him cry out the virtues of the pretender to the throne. …

https://thewire.in/politics/naidu-nitish-back-modi-ignoring-the-pain-of-all-those-who-have-suffered-during-his-10-year-tenure

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