"...like the country he leads, Modi is full of contradictions. A relentless modernizer, Indian PM embraces the past and talks about 11-day fast to launch Ram Temple at Ayodhya" - says Newsweek

By 2075, the Indian economy is projected to surpass America's 

".....The country Modi leads is increasingly shaping the world we live in.

*** "Understanding an Indian prime minister has never mattered more. The country Modi leads is increasingly shaping the world we live in".

Touch my vest," Narendra Modi told a startled Newsweek team interviewing the Indian prime minister in his residence in New Delhi in late March. "Come on, touch it." 

Modi challenged Nancy Cooper, Newsweek's global editor in chief, to guess what the blue jacket was made of. Cooper suggested silk. "It's recycled plastic bottles," Modi said, clearly enjoying the reaction of his surprised guests.

(thus runs the Newsweek story... first mega media coup staged by Narendra Modi in the poll season taking friends and foes by equally mega surprise) 

"The vest and the moment are vintage Modi: innovation, tradition, masterful messaging and, inevitably, some controversy. 

The vest was made popular by India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, whose great-grandson Rahul Gandhi is leading the opposition campaign to prevent Modi from winning a rare third term in elections next week. It became known as the "Nehru Jacket" and was a symbol of newly independent India's national pride as well as a fashion statement adopted by The Beatles and Sammy Davis Jr. 

Unlike Nehru, who preferred beiges and grays, Modi wears his modified version of the garment in brilliant hues. Indian retailers began selling "Modi Jackets" to capitalize on the prime minister's enormous personal popularity. And in 2018, when former South Korean President Moon Jae-in tweeted out his thanks for the prime minister's gift of perfectly tailored "Modi Vests"—not "Nehru Jackets"—the controversy nearly broke the Indian internet.

"Whatever you can rightly say about India, the opposite is also true," the Cambridge economist Joan Robinson once said. Modi, like the country he leads, is full of apparent contradictions. A relentless modernizer, Modi embraces the past. He speaks with equal pride of digital payments, green technology and his role in an ancient 11-day ritual to bring a revered Hindu deity to life, says the New York-based magazine.  

It further points out -- "India has tumbled on the World Press Freedom Index under Modi. And the prime minister sees himself as a target of hostile coverage by journalists who do not accept that India is both less liberal in ways that are important to the West and much better governed than at any time in its recent history."

"Understanding an Indian prime minister has never mattered more. The country Modi leads is increasingly shaping the world we live in. Washington sees India as an important counterweight to China across the developing world. 

A globe-girdling Indian diaspora, cultivated for decades by Modi, has already reshaped Silicon Valley. 

Now Indian ideas, innovations and ambitions are poised to do the same in everything from finance and fighting poverty to space exploration. 

By 2075, the Indian economy is projected to surpass America's and become the world's second largest behind China." 

To Western observers, Modi's messaging tactics can come across as political theater, the squandering of public resources on the making of one man's myth. 

What they miss is the revolutionary impact these tactics have had on people in a hierarchical society shaped by millennia-old caste structures, centuries of colonial exploitation and decades of rule by the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty whose charismatic leaders are dismissed by Modi's followers as members of a Western-educated elite -- says 'Newsweek' article.

***** Modi magic or mocking at Sickularism: 

"A magnetic orator who fills stadiums wherever he goes, Modi is coy about his speaking skills. "I didn't even know that I am good at communication," he said. Ask him about listening skills and he swells with pride: "I am god-gifted with this quality."  (says the article) 

India's urban consumers are the most optimistic in the world, according to an IPSOS survey released in March. The national index score of 72, higher than any of the other 28 economies surveyed, "indicates consumers have confidence in the economy, jobs, personal finances and investments, now and for the future," IPSOS said.

***

A country that was once notorious for potholes, bottlenecks, crumbling terminal buildings and traffic snarls caused by cattle, is now competing with the best on many fronts. India's ports are more efficient than America's or Singapore's with ship turnaround times of less than a day. It will soon boast the world's third-largest metro network after China and Britain.

Goldman's projections show the U.S. economy doubling in size by 2075 and China's just about tripling. The Indian economy will grow 15-fold. The economic value of these investments understates their impact on the way Indians, like the Chinese and Japanese before them, see themselves. 

"India is undertaking a vast national project of state-building under Modi," Ravi Agrawal, editor in chief of Foreign Policy magazine, wrote this week. 

Modi's supporters see Hindu nationalist policies as leveling the playing field, taking away privileges granted to Indian Muslims, Christians and others by colonial rulers and past governments after independence. Restoring what Hindus see as the status quo is key to both progress and national unity, they believe - the article adds. 

ends