With an astute political communicator such as Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi, the message often lies in deliberate wordplay. Which is why the use of the word parivarjan (family members) as many as 48 times in his Independence Day address this year is strategic. Moving away from mitron (friends) and bhaiyo aur behno (brothers and sisters) to parivarjan, the PM is setting himself up as a lead member of a family of 1.4 billion Indians. The contrast with his political rivals whom he accuses of parivarwaad or dynastic politics is sharpened. But does the PM’s trishul of parivarwaad, bhrashtachar (corruption) and appeasement resonate as effectively as it did nine years ago?
Let’s start with the original brahmastra of parivarwaad. In 2014, Modi was the archetypal outsider, a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh pracharak turned chief minister who was a chaiwallah’s son and not part of the privileged Lutyens’ elite. His principal rival, Rahul Gandhi, was typecast as a fifth generation dynast, a shehzada (prince) of the so-called Delhi Sultanate. The kaamdar (worker) versus naamdar (dynast) binary narrative worked perfectly, especially as Gandhi did little to repudiate the popular view that he had the Congress’s reins only because he was Sonia and Rajiv Gandhi’s son.
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