We've heard Modi talk but we need to see some action, says Shashi Tharoor at Jaipur LitFest

“Is there a non-Tharoor counter where I can just buy my books?” That comment inside the Amazon bookstore at the Jaipur Literature Festival just about sums up the impact of Shashi Tharoor signing books in the middle of the already crazy pandemonium of JLF. Tharoor has been keeping up a dogged schedule of appearances at literature festivals, ignoring both the rumours and charges swirling around social media and the TV cameras that follow him around anxious for sound bites. At the opening of the Jaipur Literature Festival, festival producer Sanjoy Roy joked that reporters ask him what would be this festival’s controversy. But if the media was hoping Tharoor would provide that they were disappointed. [caption id=“attachment_2061753” align=“alignleft” width=“380” class=" “] Shashi Tharoor. Reuters[/caption] Tharoor behaved like any other famous writer at the festival - smiled, waved, talked on stage, signed autographs. But for the phalanx of security he could have been Amish Tripathi who incidentally was holding a press conference not to launch his new book but to ANNOUNCE his next series. At his session with Mihir Sharma hosted by Amrita Tripathi, Tharoor stuck to the script of his new book IndiaShastra describing himself as a “rare bird” in India - a liberal hawk. He quoted from his book to say that some of Narendra Modi’s speeches could have been scripted by a liberal but quickly steered away from any Janardhan Dwivedi territory by saying “the gap between articulation and implementation was wide enough to drive a rath through.” If one word dominated his session it was “implementation”. That to Tharoor is the Achilles heel of the Modi sarkar. “We hear his speeches. But no actual mechanism to implement what comes out of his mouth,” said Tharoor. For him the last budget was underwhelming - more of a “name-changer” than a “game-changer” where programmes started or contemplated by the UPA had merely gotten a facelift or a name-lift. Tharoor has gotten into trouble with his party for appearing to not be “Opposition” enough to Narendra Modi. But at Jaipur he made it a point to attack Modi for not walking the talk. The consequences of that he said would be catastrophic. 50.1% of India is under 25. 225 million are between 10 and 19. By 2020, 116 million people will be starting work while China will be down to 93 million. “Only if we can equip these people with training and education can we take advantage of the opportunity provided by this demographic advantage,” said Tharoor. Otherwise we just end up with legions of “unemployable” youth. Tharoor feels India is poised at this moment to move from “politics of identity” to a “politics of performance” and Modi’s speeches reflect that. That “politics of performance” is what those 116 million people starting work in 2020 will need. But Tharoor maintains the BJP along with its RSS/VHP allies is ill-suited to make that jump since it is tied to the politics of identity and many in those outfits are least interested in opening up the economy, liberalization and foreign policy. “This is the last chance to convince those who believe our potential that we are capable of fulfilling our potential,” warned Tharoor. “If we don’t get it right this time believe me we are not coming back.” He said he had already gotten emails from investors such as one in Germany worried about church attacks in India. “Why as a Christian German will he bring 250 million to India then? Will Arabs come invest in our country if Muslims do not feel secure?” Tharoor asked. According to him if Modi does not read his party’s nativist hotheads “the riot act at all levels” his economic agenda and the promises he made to voters cannot be fulfilled and if they cannot be fulfilled Congress will be waiting for the next election. That might sound like wishful thinking. The Congress has not shown any signs of recovery yet. And there is an underlying assumption in Tharoor’s statements that Modi has moved beyond his RSS pracharak roots. But as Modi tries to win state elections in order to alter the makeup of the Rajya Sabha he needs all the RSS “stormtroopers” to come to his side. And Tharoor maintains they are the ones not interested in the economic agenda that Modi espouses. That to him is the fundamental contradiction that might doom Moditva. “Implementation of good ideas has been our national weakness,” he said and Modi would have to deliver on that front beyond tagging people on his Swach Bharat campaign. Even there he said Swach Bharat is a good idea but people sometimes don’t pick up garbage because there’s no place to take it. It again comes back to implementation. “Today it’s not the country with the bigger army that wins. But the country with better story that wins,” Tharoor said. “But the better story has to be real story.” Not a hashtag.