NRIs kept the faith, PM Narendra Modi didn't fail them

WASHINGTON: The story goes that there was a time in the 1990s when Narendra Modi was somewhat of an NRI himself. He spent long weeks, even months, abroad, particularly in the US, where there's a large Indian and Gujarati diaspora. As an RSS ideologue tasked with spreading the Sangh Parivar gospel, he travelled across America, and according to a close associate from those days, visited 29 of the 50 states. He reportedly latched on to a Delta Airlines ticket which cost $400 those days and allowed a flyer to travel unlimited for a month as a stand-by passenger (as long the plane had an empty seat), logging thousands of miles.

Friends in Washington DC, Boston, Chicago, LA and other cities received him as he arrived with the lightest baggage (a friend recounts having to teach him to use the laundry with the lightest setting). Photographs of that time show a lean, scholarly man posing in front of American tourist attractions including the White House. The same friends kept faith in Modi through nearly a decade of US ostracizing him. They latched on to his growth story in Gujarat (personal and economic) through televised addresses, satellite images, and holograms.

When Modi led the BJP to a stunning majority last year, this faithful constituency erupted in joy, which found full expression when the PM visited the US last September, most notably at the Madison Square Garden event. That event has now become the template for Modi's NRI outreach, as he sought to repeat it in Australia, Germany, Canada, even China and South Korea. Of course nothing on the US scale is possible elsewhere (save perhaps in UK, which he's yet to visit), given the size of the Indian diaspora in the US, particularly the Gujaratis.

Small wonder too that NRIs — who've always had Delhi's ear — are still pandered to by the government with everything from banking concessions to visa norms. New Delhi's economic team increasingly has a "Made in USA" look.

While he still had plenty of left-liberal critics across the world, what has really pumped up NRIs' adulation is the government's swift response to travails of those caught in war zones such as Yemen, although previous governments too did this with less fanfare. Modi has also signalled that he has a more expansive vision of India's reach and ties with the diaspora, beyond NRIs to PIOs judging by his forays to Fiji, Mauritius, Seychelles among others.

The energetic response to developments in neighboring Lanka and the crisis in Nepal suggests he has a capacious vision of India's sphere of influence, although critics have quickly pointed out that he has so far not travelled to any Muslim country, some of which have large Indian-origin populations, not to speak of some which were part of undivided India. But overall, a year into his prime ministership, NRIs and PIOs remain in thrall of Modi despite the growing murmurs - which are almost perpetual — of things not moving fast enough in India.