The First Twenty-one Days of the New Government

As the new Modi Government formally took up the reins of the government on 26th May – ten days after its decisive victory in the national elections – it found itself showered with such affection and high hopes and expectations from the Indian people that its single most important concern must be to prove itself worthy of it all. During this first period, even while the government has been busy putting the new top administrative machinery in place and tightening the reins of the government, the spirit and order in which the whole thing has been conducted has been such as to keep the people’s spirits and hopes up. The unambiguous message that has been radiating from all that the new government has been saying and doing, so far, may be summed up in the following fourfold formula: Sincere Dedication to the Nation, Hard Work, Harmony and Goodwill for All.
Now, a sincere dedication to the cause of the nation – the modern conception of nationalism is too narrow and limiting, especially in the case of an utterly tolerant and truly spiritual country like India, to convey the real spirit behind it – may be translated as dedication not only to India in its surface parts but also, and much more, to its soul manifest in the spirit of its eternal religion and tradition for the good of all creation. Even if it is partially manifest – as it seems to be in some members of Sri Narendra Modi’s team – such a thing can prove to be an inexhaustible source of energy for the unceasing hard work that is likely to be required to put the country back on the right track (after almost a millennium of straying). Such a thing can and does happen by virtue of the fact that a true spirit of love and dedication tends to minimise and even altogether dissolve the limiting and psychologically unpleasant side-effects of the enormous and sustained concentration of energies that this kind of work entails. Thus, sincere dedication and sustained hard work can always go together smoothly.
A democratic government may be successfully run on the basis of a parliamentary majority but a country – especially a country like India with its rich linguistic, cultural and religious diversity – cannot be profitably run without the tacit support of its people at large and this may be ensured only by a spirit of harmony in the leadership. All this is not intended to suggest that the new government which has taken its stand on harmony can – even in its most earnest pursuits – be expected to be free from appearances of struggle, opposition and even open strife because – given the psychological condition of the present-day humanity – these things have become the unavoidable accompaniments of the functioning of modern parliamentary democracies. Even so, a persistent spirit of harmony can be expected to smoothen the whole course of governance by bringing about adjustment and accommodation among diverse interests and claims much oftener than would be possible otherwise. Thus a sincere spirit of dedication and harmony may enable the present leadership of the country to arrive at a psychological condition where it spontaneously feels and works for the true well-being of the country.
With the hope that this will actually come to pass, we wish all possible success to the new government not only in substantially fulfilling the high hopes that Indian people at large have come to focus on it but also in paving the long road towards the fulfilment of even those dreams which have always been latent in the soul of eternal India and have found their most complete expression in the writings and statements of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother on the future of India – the subject of the next article in this issue.