Modi should go. We have had enough of a mess created in India ever since he came to power in 2014. The successive mismanagements of the needless Demonetisation, then the confusion created by GST which today the Centre is not adhering to and finally the disaster of the COVID19 that has led to massive suffering and the unnecessary loss of life. Everything that he has touched and tried to do in his stint since becoming PM has come unstuck. The famous hug that Modi used to employ while greeting the mostly top leaders of the world has been repaid by Xi of China by stabbing him in the back. With Abe of Japan retiring from public life the relations with Japan will have to be cultivated all over again. With Britain changing Prime Ministers we will have to start from Ground Zero with Boris Johnson even divorcing his Indian origin wife. In France Macron is beset with his own problems. In Germany Merkel gets her famous fainting fits when you mention Modi. Closer home the enmity with Pakistan is being honed to a fine sharpness with Modi thankfully learning that he needs to stay away from that country. Nepal is looking the other way towards China at the mention of India. With Bangladesh we have only barter deals like hilsa for onions etc. and disputes on Ganga water sharing. Sri Lanka has a more stridently nationalist government exemplifying complete family rule. Inside the country we have lately seen a complete lack of imagination in the handling of the COVID19 pandemic where in a short while we will lead the charts worldwide in terms of the number of infections, in terms of the high recovery rate and the low death rate. However, the principal focus should have been to 'lock out' the virus at the individual level rather than completely 'lockdown' the country. This approach would have seen lower infections and a faster return to normalcy of our economy and our society. As for cushioning the impact of the pandemic on the economy and provide succour to the people this government has been found absolutely lacking. It makes a lot about limited superficial measures like giving free rations to families and meagre sums given to Jan Dhan account holders when other countries around the world have done much more for its people, trade and industry. The approach to assistance to the people of India can be equated of kneading dough with a tight fist and then passing out to others only that limited amount that squeezes out between the fingers. With a Finance Minister like Nirmala Sitharaman this has struck a chord and nothing much has been done to bail out the people of this country during these pandemic times when millions of jobs have been lost. Within the country despite the spread of the pandemic, law and order is a concern with Kashmir remaining on the boil, UP continuing to be the rape capital of India and other parts of the country in turmoil in the wake of the pandemic and also for other reasons. Democracy has been forsaken with the ordinance route being taken for most laws and passed later without much discussions and debate. And lately democracy has been murdered on the floor of the august house during the passing of the three farm laws to regularise ordinances. Democracy has to be understood by those practising it as the ability to convince and reassure people mostly the Opposition and the lay public before you act on any measure or legislation. But what we are seeing with the present government is that they act first and then seek to convince later in a 'we know better than you' and 'we know what is good for you' modes. Such modus operandi are not the characteristics of a thriving and vibrant democracy but exercising your power by throwing your weight around through the brute force of an electoral majority. We have seen this methodology during Demonetisation and later including the present mismanagement of the COVID19 pandemic where close to 100,000 deaths have occurred. For a lesser scale of fatalities, charges of genocide are brought against country's leaders. So also Modi should be charged with genocide for leading the people of this country like the Pied Piper of Hamelin over the COVID19 cliff to their deaths. Or maybe we have to wait for the genocide charge to be brought against his buddy, Donald Trump in the US which is leading the world in COVID19 also with more than 200,000 deaths. There was a time in India when leaders felt accountable when things went wrong in the portfolios that they helmed and in the event of a major disaster/debacle, these leaders like Lal Bahadur Shastri and Gulzarilal Nanda and even some latter day leaders, the names of whom one forgets, would resign. So also should Modi resign accepting the mess he has created in handling the COVID19 pandemic which has created so much distress and trauma in people's lives.
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