Today I’m standing before you as the son of a poor man. This is the strength of democracy’.
The Prime Minister-Elect has made it clear – it shall be a Government of the poor, for the poor, by the poor. It has to be if it is to be a Government for the nation.
No one likes to admit they are poor. A nation does not want to appear poor. But the first step to greatness is recognising what we are, but also our aspirations to be greater. Working for anything greater than ourselves will always make us materially poor, but richer in all other ways – trust me – I know!
For all who think this victory is about taxation, infrastructure bottlenecks, and opening the economy – they will be superbly shocked. Those who have been flaunting their wealth, about how rich they are off the back of the labours of the poor on minimum wage – you are on the wrong side of history.
Read carefully the emotion in the speeches. This is a Government of national service. If your projects do not highlight how the poor will benefit, what social benefits to them, to the nation, if you play the same old games of thinking big money mean access, means project approvals, you are going to be left behind.
As I said to a group of private equity investors, ‘tread softly, for this is the land of my ancestors, the home of genius, of philosopher kings, of astronomy before the Greeks, of navies before the Romans, of great cities before the Egyptians, of Universities before the Anglo-Saxons, of art before the Renaissance and of faith before Christ and Moses. Tread softly, for you walk on the graves of my forefathers.’
When you look around you may see the poor, I see the shame of what has befallen a great and wondrous civilisation, always too open to foreign influence, I see royal blood in paupers clothes. You see a destitute woman, I see the honour of a nation reduced to begging on the streets.
So when I co-host for the British Government the largest collection of investors in India at the end of August, this is what I will remind them. Their money, their investments, their talents, are not welcome in India, not needed, unless they serve first the nation, not just their pocket books. Unless they seek to do that, they should pack their bags and go home, they are not welcome. They will be desecrating a mother herself. Bewarned.
One sixth of all humanity sleeps and wakes under an Indian sky. The world is poor for as long as India is poor. By our own efforts for sure, but all the world, all humanity is poor for as long as India is.
The PM-elect references that the nation is the mother. ‘Mother India’. To all the investors who do not understand the philosophy behind this victory, behind the pain and ignominy that India, that Bharat has long suffered, they will not understand the country, they will not understand why this victory came about and what a national spirit, so long denied, cries out for, to release its spirit, to be up where she belongs.
As the words of the unofficial national anthem state:
Thou art Durga, Lady and Queen,
With her hands that strike and her
swords of sheen,
Thou art Lakshmi lotus-throned,
And the Muse a hundred-toned,
Pure and perfect without peer,
Mother lend thine ear,
Mother sweet, I salute thee,
Mother great and free!
Alpesh Patel
Political Animal 