A few months ago, I was annoyed at a Business Associate in India. It was 9 pm in India, and I wanted a quote from him, an informal one. He flippantly told me it was a Saturday evening, and he will get back to me by Monday morning.
Since I had to meet my commitment to my client, I burned the wires, and got not one but two quotes, including a formal one within the next 3 hours.
When my friend got back to me finally by Monday afternoon, I had already closed the deal, much to his chagrin.
He was cross at me for not giving him the deal, but he had only himself to blame.
About two decades ago, people sought quotes over normal mail, which were sent through courier, and the Purchase Order would reach the buyer after 21 days of the initial action by the Seller. One had time to take a decision, and afford to take things slowly.
Those days are gone. You are lucky if you get 21 hours now. I get annoyed when I send a mail or a whatsapp message to a supplier and don’t get a reply within 21 minutes!
We are living in a dynamic world, and if you want to be successful you have to be on the button 24x7, 365 days.
The above anecdote clearly sums up the difference between BJP under Modi and Amit Shah, and Congress under Sonia, Rahul Gandhi.
Congress leaders are made to wait for days to get an audience with Sonia and Rahul, if at all they get a chance. Whereas Modi and Shah move within seconds of sensing an opportunity, working 24x7.
See how they formed a Government in the night in Goa when they didn’t have the numbers. While Digvijay Singh was dilly dallying, waiting for a green signal from Rahul Gandhi, Gadkari took the bull by the horn, stitched up a majority and got Manohar Parricker to resign as Defence Minister in the night, and stake claim to form the Government by early morning. Congress didn’t know what hit them.
Bihar situation, though not exactly similar, also showed the dexterity of Modi and Shah. To everyone it was clear that Nitish Kumar was itching to get out of the Mahagatbhandan for the past 6-8 months. It was critical for Congress to ensure Nitish Kumar was kept in good humor, as without him there was not Mahagatbandhan in 2019. But Sonia and Rahul slept while the wheels turned (to be precise Rahul was holidaying).
Modi and Shah were, in the meanwhile, assiduously cultivating Nitish Kumar all the while, and invited him for a dinner late last week and chalked out the exit plan for Nitish. Rahul, instead of going to meet Nitish Kumar with folded hands as he is far too senior to him, summoned Nitish Kumar for a meeting, which itself is cause enough for Nitish to quit the Alliance.
Instead of appreciating Nitish’s difficulty in working with the accused Tejashwi Yadav as Dy CM, Rahul tried to placate him. He failed to understand that it was never about the charge sheet of Tejashwi, but the fact that RJD was quietly planning a coup to get rid of Nitish Kumar, and anoint Tejashwi as CM of Bihar. That would have proved the death knell for Nitish’s political future.
He had been with NDA for a long time, and had no reservations about joining with BJP again, as BJP is a dependable partner, who has only supported him in the past. It was only a miscalculation that led to Nitish leaving BJP, probably blinded by his attachment to LK Advani, who used him to get back at Modi.
It took Sonia and Rahul three hours to even respond to Nitish’s resignation on Wednesday. During that time Modi had tweeted Nitish, BJP MLAs held a meeting, went over to Nitish Kumar’s house for dinner, elected him NDA Leader and he then staked claim to form a Government.
The rest is history.
With this one act, Modi and Shah destroyed the opposition unity and ensured a second term for Modi in 2019.
Welcome to the new era of Politics in India!
P.S: Contrary to what RJD, Congress, CPI(M) and the compromised Media are telling us, the 2015 Bihar verdict was not a Secular vs Communal one, nor was it anti Modi.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha Elections the Vote Share was
NDA - BJP 29.4%, Other NDA 9.4% Total 38.8%
UPA - RJD 20.1%, Congress 8.4% Total 28.5%
JDU – 15.8%
If you add JDU to UPA, the total vote share was 44.3%
In 2015, post Mahagatbandhan, the Vote Share was,
NDA - BJP 24.4%, Other NDA 9.8% Total 34.2%
UPA - RJD 18.4%, Congress 6.7%, JDU – 16.8% Total 41.9%
It is clear that it was a question of which two of three, BJP,RJD and JDU join together, and win the election. A question of simple mathematics.
Nothing to do with ideology or secularism or any other stupid things our media guys bleats about. If JDU had joined hands with NDA, they would have probably won with lose to 48% votes plus. In fact RJD and Congress saw their vote shares drop despite Mahagatbandhan. Chew over it.
