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Published: 22:50 GMT, 30 June 2014, MailOnline India, Mail Today

Author and eminent scholar Dan Hahn described successful political communication as something where “some will be attracted to what is said, to the position taken by the orator. Others will be impressed by the orator’s crafting of the speech – the organisation, the word choice, or the how the language is combined.”

He might as well have been describing the #NaMo campaign, where the combination of a message of hope, soft ideology and communication craftsmanship has attracted a substantial number of voters within and outside BJP’s traditional vote bank.

Assessment

The new Indian PM ran an efficient and professional campaign that was arguably even more innovative than the first Obama campaign.

Moving forward: Prime Minister Narendra Modi (left) invited his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif (right) to his swearing-in ceremony, a move which characterised the forward thinking nature of his election campaign. The momentum has yet to translate into major institutional changes
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However, the million-dollar question is whether PM Modi will be able to institutionalise this communication expertise into a durable feature of his time in office, or if he will struggle, as President Obama has in recent years, to communicate his initiatives and vision to large parts of the citizenry.

The first 30 days offer us a moment to reflect on the communication performance of the PM. It is a mixed bag.
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On the upside, we have witnessed deft public positioning, like the invitation extended to South Asian neighbours during his swearing-in ceremony or his visit to Bhutan – each appreciated as significant gestures and adding to his image as a progressive leader.

We have seen the institutionalisation of social media by the Modi Cabinet to reach out to citizens. And we now have #NaMo on twitter in person and in his official persona.

Yet, something is amiss. The PM’s persuasive presence during his campaign is now reduced to clinical digital chatter.

The message, therefore, is incomplete and sometimes unclear. Other voices, some of dissent (rail price hike) and other incongruent, from within and outside his party are muddying the waters very early into his term in office.

The communication code that he had cracked seems to have been misplaced and it is apparent that the campaign team that ably communicated PM aspirant Modi’s vision to many, is either avoiding the Delhi summers or is distracted.

During the election, candidate Modi was ahead of the curve. He was proactive and anticipated issues; he sidestepped curve balls and revelled in responding to provocations.

After the elections, PM Modi has been playing catch up, been largely reactive, and has failed to anticipate imminent challenges.

Vision

Modi has prided himself in being able to empower and use the bureaucracy in Gujarat, and now he hopes to do the same in Delhi.

However, is his communication also going to be defined by the not-so-creative Delhi Durbar? Will slow-moving bureaucratic systems do justice to a man known for his glib oratory skills and deft communication?

Let’s take the swearing-in ceremony as a case in point.

The soon-to-be Indian PM invited Nawaz Sharif and other SAARC leaders (and Mauritius) for his swearing-in ceremony. It was a grand spectacle that did create excitement and was largely appreciated, and yet one was left with a hollow feeling the day after.

Groundbreaking: The new Indian PM ran an efficient and professional campaign that was arguably even more innovative than the first Obama campaign
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We got to know what the MEA felt about it – its official statement offered standard, cut and dry and politically correct fare.

We know what every Pakistan watcher and self-styled foreign policy expert on television and on the op-ed pages thinks about it. But we still do not know what PM Modi thinks about it.

What is this big-picture neighbourhood philosophy that he seems to be crafting? Or is there one? It was his show all the way, and his views and vision are still missing.

More recently, when the rapes and murders took place in Badaun and when the Muslim youth was killed in Pune, a calibrated communication response was required.

While there may have been no need for the PM to react himself, a statement from the Home Minister, showing concern, would have helped assuage the shrill response by civil society and the media.

The government was absent on this count.

PM Modi must realise that his victory is his to own alone, and so is all that goes wrong.

Revitalise

Silence is golden, but there is such a thing as too much silence. These are early days and PM Modi is not really affected. Yet, a crisis could unfold at any point. That is the nature of government, and systems must be in place.

Modi has always faced a hostile media. This has not changed since his election. The honeymoon period may be shorter than anticipated and questions will be asked, and the din will get louder each week.

During the election campaign, his masterstroke was bypassing media and engaging directly with people. He needs to do this while being in office as well.

It will help to explain the big but potentially controversial policies he wants to pursue.

Of course, he can’t do it every week or every day as he did during the campaign.As such he will need to think of a routine, and of a creative mechanism to manage public expectations and the media.

The PRO cannot remain out of bounds for the media, not for the media’s sake but for the sake of the PM and for the policy line he wishes to perpetuate and guard.

In power: The PM’s persuasive presence during his campaign is now reduced to clinical digital chatter
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This is how governments work everywhere. Twitter and other social media platforms are excellent communication tools and the PM has mastered their political potency faster than most Indian politicians.

In government, he needs to build a platform that combines social media with more traditional communications mechanisms.

He needs to disrupt the lethargy of the Lutyens communication machinery by introducing some of his young campaign team into the mix, and he needs to reinvent and revitalise #NaMo in his new role as PM.

It was #NaMo that got him here.

The writer is Vice-President and Senior Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation

PUBLISHED: 21:46 GMT, 4 June 2014, Mail Online India, Mail Today

Original Link is here

Task ahead: Prime Minister will have to clear an economic landscape that has been cluttered with debris from the previous ten years

NaMo 282.0 is in an unenviable position. The astonishing majority he singularly scripted for the BJP and its allies surprised most, including his party and perhaps even himself.

This mandate also disappointed a number of others. The Congress for one must now surely realise that “poverty pornography” and “pseudo-secular” positioning have now reached their sell-by date.

The BJP’s allies will also have seen the writing on the wall – that they will be able to secure a ministerial berth at the centre, but will neither have a veto over the BJP leader nor will their tantrums affect the political trajectory of this government.

And finally, some within the BJP would recognise this mandate as a vote against the factions within the party that were gleefully awaiting a fractured verdict, which would in turn have allowed them some weight over the PM and the PMO.

Reassertion

Nonetheless, this is an unenviable position to be in for the Prime Minister. This huge mandate comes with commensurate expectations.

With little by way of a fail-safe or escape route #NaMo ran the campaign on the promise of better days or “achche din” and that is exactly what most of us will be seeking from him.

The most obvious task before Modi will be to revive India’s growth narrative. This narrative is as central to the millions living in poverty in this country as it is to the entrepreneurial class that is competing with the world.

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The message to domestic and global audiences has to be both clear and simple; India is back and it is open for business.

To achieve this, the Prime Minister will be required to navigate a complex policy terrain. He will have to clear an economic landscape that has been cluttered with debris from the previous ten years.

And most importantly, he will now have to clear the most important real estate that had been lost to others over the past decade – the policy space of the ‘Executive’.

This real estate, the policy domain of the executive, will need to be reclaimed from a number of encroachers including crony capitalists, regulators, legal institutions, activist groups and the media itself.

A nebulous National Advisory Council that seemed only created to develop unsustainable schemes and undermine the PMO; a revertal to failed “fabian socialist ideology” where profit was pariah and corporates were criminals; a weak central leadership unable to combat and act against corruption; and a central cabinet where every Minister thought of himself or herself as a Prime Minister, resulted in rampant rent-seeking, policy-gaming, and a fragile executive.

#NaMo’s first set of actions will have to be to reassert the primacy of the executive. There are three balancing acts required:

Control

Due to the perverse environment of the past years, citizens and media had goaded, invited and encouraged the intervention of the Judiciary into the policy space.

The institution of last resort became the first port of call for remedying everything that seemed to be going wrong.

Some termed it judicial activism, others commended this decisiveness to protect national interest.

Whatever the description, nature abhors a vacuum and when the executive leadership was weak and feeble, another had to step in.

The new dispensation at the Centre will have to delicately rebalance this role. Instead of deciding the fairness and legality of some of the constitutional challenges of a growing nation, the judiciary has been forced to cross the rubicon and into the policy space reserved for the elected.

#NaMo will have to reverse this trend and make decisions his predecessor could not have, and the judiciary need not have.

His second step would be to limit the power of the new gatekeepers – the regulators. Between 1947 and 1990 India’s economic policy was governed by “License Raj”, which has now transitioned to “Regulator Raj”.

In the financial sector alone, India has at least four different regulators. Policy is now dependent on clearance by bodies originally intended for creating a friendly and/or stable economic condition.

For example, the mandate of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) is to audit the expenditure and receipts of the government and not to dictate how it should be spending or allocating resources.

While interventions may have been necessary when an emboldened cabinet was free to make decisions, without a strong executive chaperone, the role of the regulator now must return to the original mandate.

We have reached the ridiculous stage when a regulator will soon decide which fighter jet India should procure and at what price.

The accountant must be consigned to the accounts book.

Recalibration

Finally, #NaMo will also have to wrestle policy decisions out of the hands of the media panels at primetime.

Less than 10% per cent of homes with TV sets, watch news and less than ten per cent of those homes watch English news.

Yet, anchors and media personalities claim to speak for the nation. With the previous dispensation these media maharajas could sway government decisions – forcing the discarding of an ordinance for instance and they could challenge executive decisions, including mundane transfers and postings.

The PM’s mandate comes with a long list of development expectations

Babus of all ranks leaked files to the media, disgruntled elements used the media to create controversy and soon the primetime panel was the ‘durbar’ of choice to undermine, scuttle and challenge executive decisions.

This role of recalibration of the media may be the toughest of tasks for the new executive. But the Prime Minister has the mandate.

He also has the experience of managing many of these institutions while he was Chief Minister of Gujarat. And if he can reignite the economy he will also have the authority to wrestle back the executive space.

The writer is senior fellow and vice president at the Observer Research Foundation