What Should Be The Number One Priority For Modi 3.0?
This can be achieved only by implementing the relevant recommendations of ARC2 and CPC 4 through CPC 7. It is our hope that this will happen in Modi 3.0.
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What Narendra Modi and BJP are about to accomplish is an achievement of both ‘Herculean’ and ‘Gargantuan’ proportions.
Herculean because winning a third consecutive term in a democracy is considered a difficult task that requires tremendous strength, effort, or courage, alluding to the labours of the Greek hero Hercules. While the term Herculean can also describe size, the emphasis is usually on the difficulty involved.
Gargantuan because of the immense size, scale, and degree of this electoral achievement is likely to be astonishing and overwhelming. It requires guts to say with confidence: “Abki bar, 400 par.” The term gargantuan derives from the giant Gargantua in the works of François Rabelais.
Of the fourteen prime ministers that have governed India since 1947, only Jawaharlal Nehru served for three consecutive terms. It turns out that it is also equally rare in the mother of all democracies – United Kingdom. For example, Margaret Thatcher entered the record books in 1987, becoming the longest continuously-serving prime minister in more than a hundred years since Lord Liverpool (1812–1827), and the first to win three successive elections since Lord Palmerston in 1865. She won general elections in 1979, 1983 and 1987. Similarly, the other modern time prime minister to win three consecutive general elections in modern times would be Tony Blair winning elections in 1997, 2001 and 2005.
Prior to Blair and Thatcher, no British Prime Minister had served three consecutive terms. To be sure there were three prime ministers in the long democratic history of Britain who served three terms but not consecutively. They were as follows:
It is not only rare in the oldest democracy in the world, but also, in fact, impossible in the most powerful democracy – America. So, it is the rarest of the rarest democratic phenomenon to have a Prime Minister elected for three consecutive terms. Therefore, Modi merely winning the 2024 general election would be, as argued earlier, both a Herculean and Gargantuan achievement for Mr. Modi and the BJP. There is no doubt about that, and we must give the credit where it is due.
However, a review of the available and comparable history of other similar systems reveals that immediately after the third term, there is an inevitable decline in the fortunes of the party and hence also the nation. Nehru was succeeded by Lal Bahadur Shastri, whose 1 year 7-month term ended in his death in Tashkent. Political uncertainty led to family rule in the Congress and the country. Similarly, in Britian the three term stalwarts were followed by seemingly weak prime ministers with short tenures.
The pertinent questions are (i) why a strong democratic leader is followed by weak ones and concomitant instability? (ii) is it inevitable? and (iii) what can be done to prevent instability that follows the absence of a three-term giant in a democracy?
Successful, energetic and capable leaders are in a hurry to get the job done. Mr. Modi frequently tells a story of how he was faced with the massive calamity of the Gujarat earthquake in 2001 even before he took the oath of the CM in Gujarat in October 2002. He tells the story of going straight to the earthquake site after taking the oath and calling a meeting of the concerned officers, who told him that all this will be achieved by the end of the financial year on March 31, 2003. Mr. Modi refused to accept that deadline and asked them to do the necessary rehabilitation work by January 26, 2003, when he expected the entire international media to be present to ask about the status of recovery from the earthquake. He personally followed every project and as a result this was done successfully with widespread praise for him in the international media.
This is but one example of his hands-on management style. One can give countless examples of such examples since he has become the Prime Minister of India. The on-time completion of the Parliament building, and the Ram Temple in Ayodhya are prominent and well-known examples of this style. Through intensive hands-on monitoring he has managed to imbibe a similar culture in all his ministerial colleagues. Hence, the roads, airports, defence equipment, railways infrastructure, etc. are all getting built and delivered on time and to the agreed specifications.
Alas, the management literature tells us that such personalized style of management, though workable in the short run, is not sustainable in the long run. No doubt that highly personalized and person centric approach can yield impressive results in the short run, but the system loses steam as soon as the driving force of the leader is absent.
Today, all management experts agree that 80 % of the effectiveness of an organization or entity depends on the quality of its systems and only 20 % on the people running the system. Therefore, in a good system ordinary people rise to the occasion and deliver good performance. Within the people category, leadership plays an important role. According to experts, 80 percent of the contribution from the people category comes from leadership. In other words, all one needs is a good leader with a good system and miracles can happen. In fact, it is the job of the leader to create good systems.
The following diagram depicts this argument well: We started by asking the question: What should be the number one priority for MODI 3.0? Now I hope the answer to the original question is obvious. In his third term, Mr. Modi should work on creating systems that are not dependent on one person’s energy, commitment and enthusiasm. These systems (and institutions) should embody his management style and should be capable of running on autopilot. I am certainly not saying that he is not aware of the above arguments. In fact, I know for a fact that he is. He told me so in a meeting with him in 2012. Few people in India know that Mr. Modi is the first Chief Minister in the country to have obtained an ISO 9001 certification for the Gujarat Chief Minister’s Office in 2006, much ahead of what Central Government did in 2012.
Let me end by offering two concrete examples of system-enhancing institutional reforms that should be his priority for Modi 3.0
First, Modi 3.0 should implement the un-implemented but much-repeated recommendation of the successive Central Pay Commissions. The Fourth Pay Commission set up in 1983 recommended an increase in the salaries of the Central Government employees on the condition that the Government of India will implement a Performance Related Incentive System (PRIS). Government of India accepted both recommendation and they were published in the Gazette of India. However, only the pay increase was implemented but the recommendation on linking Central Government employees pays to performance was left unimplemented. Since then, the 5th, 6th and 7th Pay Commissions have expressed great disappointment with the non-implementation of the PRIS. I hope this can be a priority in Modi 3.0. International experience suggests that this change in the system alone can be a game changer.
Experience suggests that to link performance with pay, government will have to define performance and hold the civil servants accountable for performance and results. This is not a new idea for either Mr. Modi or the BJP. This is exactly what BJP promised in their 2014 manifesto. Time has come to deliver on that institution enhancing promise from its 2014 manifesto:
Second, Modi 3.0 should implement the 1200 or so recommendations of the Second Administrative Reform Commission (ARC 2) accepted and approved by a Group of Ministers in the previous Government. The Second Administrative Reforms Commission (ARC) was set up on August 31, 2005. It submitted 15 reports in staggered phases between June 2006 and May 2009. Most of the major recommendations that could dramatically alter the system are lying unimplemented. That would change the system and make our path to development more certain.
In this context, Modi 3.0 would do well to start with the Tenth Report of the Second Administrative Reform Commission. It recommended that “performance agreement is the most common accountability mechanism in most countries that have reformed their public administration systems. This has been done in many forms - from explicit contracts to less formal negotiated agreements…” India has experience with implementing these performance agreements in both Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs) as the instrument of Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) and in Central Government ministries and departments as Results Framework Documents.
Today, the long-run competitive advantage of nation does not depend on resource endowment of nations but on the effectiveness of their governments. While in the short run it is possible to have an effective government based on the force of personality. In the long run, an effective government based on a sound system of performance management and accountability for results is the only sustainable and viable option. This can be achieved only by implementing the relevant recommendations of ARC2 and CPC 4 through CPC 7. It is our hope that this will happen in Modi 3.0.
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