General Elections 2014: Only IMF worried, politicians don't care about the economy

NEW DELHI: This general election was meant to be about the economy. For months in the run up to the polls, the BJP and other opposition parties attacked the UPA on slowing economic growth, the despondency in the markets, the depreciating rupee and food price inflation.

But with the campaign entering the crunch phases, and even as the first phase of this vast election got underway in the northeast, the economy has all but disappeared from fiery poll speeches. For more than a week now, the themes that have dominated have all been emotive, identity-based, personality-driven and polarising. In short, politics has wrested the campaign right back from the economy.

Amit Shah’s controversial comments about “revenge” in Muzaffarnagar, the controversy over Ram mandir and Kashmir from the BJP’s election manifesto, Azam Khan’s comments about Muslim soldiers winning the Kargil war, Imam Syed Ahmed Bukhari’s endorsement of Congress, Sonia Gandhi’s Italian origin, Sharad Pawar’s suggestion that Modi should seek treatment in a psychiatric hospital, Imran Masood’s threat to chop Modi into pieces, Beni Prasad Verma describing Modi as “RSS’ biggest goon” and Modi affixing the “cradle of terror” stamp on Kerala have all dominated the discourse. The economy, still ailing, is all but forgotten. “It’s partly because economy doesn’t lend itself to drama. The human development report can’t win you elections.

Price rise and inflation connects up to a point. But overall, Economics is a failure of story telling. The issues of scarcity, livelihood, retrenchment and displacement have not really come through in this campaign,” said social anthropologist Shiv Vishwanathan. The economy-centric narrative that dominated earlier played to the strengths of BJP’s PM candidate Narendra Modi, whose principal claim to the corner office in South Block is rooted in the economic success of Gujarat, which he has run since 2001 as chief minister. Modi’s speeches before campaigning reached fever pitch were full of development mantras.

This made sense. After all Congress’ 2009 victory was powered by urban constituencies where it won 94 seats.

But now his record as CM during the 2002 Gujarat riots is squarely back in the discourse, with opposition parties and foreign media outlets raising questions.

Even AAP’s Yogendra Yadav, a genteel psephologist under the gravest of provocations, is now facing charges that he made a communally polarising remark in Mewat, warning Muslims about the prospect of Modi becoming PM. It is not as if the voter doesn’t care about the economy. “There is ample evidence that economic performance matters in winning elections in India.

Voters respond to whether they feel they are relatively better off compared with 5-10 years ago,” said Ajay Shah, professor at the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy. “Governing coalitions get this. This is why the office of the finance minister has become so important in the last 20 years or so. But I don’t have an answer for why economy takes a backseat when it comes to campaigning,” Shah added.

Economist Bibek Debroy said: “Most of these examples (of negative campaigning) are from UP. In a state that is well governed, like TN or Maharashtra, you can try and sell the benefit of good governance. But may be the UP voter still doesn’t connect with better governance. So it is back to the old issues.”