Does India’s Covid tsunami threaten Modi’s grip on power?

As India recorded more than 348,000 coronavirus cases on Sunday, prime minister Narendra Modi acknowledged that the pandemic had ravaged the country. 

“I’m speaking to you at a time when Covid-19 is testing our patience and capacity to bear pain. Many of our loved ones left us untimely,” he said in his monthly radio programme, Mann ki Baat. 

“After successfully tackling the first wave, the nation’s morale was high, it was confident. But this storm has shaken the nation,” he said as he reiterated the importance of vaccinations and following the coronavirus protocols.

A week earlier, however, his message was slightly different. Waving at the sea of maskless supporters jostling during a rally in the election-bound state of West Bengal, Mr Modi proudly proclaimed that he had “never ever seen such huge crowds”.

His rallies went on largely uninterrupted until 22 April even as India descended into a tragedy of unprecedented proportion. Social media was flooded with images of hospitals overflowing with the sick and desperate public appeals for oxygen supplies and hospital beds. The healthcare infrastructure reached the brink of collapse.

But aside from one televised address in which he urged states to only use lockdowns as a “last resort”, Mr Modi – who has ruled since 2014 – has been conspicuously silent as the country descended into chaos.

“Our government has reduced us to our knees – begging for hospitals, oxygen, vaccinations and medicines,” Maya Mirchandani, a senior fellow at the Observer Research Foundation think tank, tells The Independent. “It has made us a failed state.”

She adds: “Mr Modi commands tremendous authority. He is one of the most popular prime ministers in India in a long time. His mandate is staggering. If there were ever a time for him to stand up for the people who chose him, it was this.”

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Leaders from several key Indian states have lashed out at Mr Modi for continuing with the election campaign even as infections surged. Maharashtra’s chief minister Uddhav Thackeray, whose state is home to India’s financial capital Mumbai, said that when he tried calling the prime minister over the shortages of medical oxygen and drugs he was told that Mr Modi is too busy addressing the rallies.

Even a former finance minister of Mr Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has criticised the prime minister. “The delight of PM at the sight of a large crowd at his election meeting in Asansol in Covid times could have come only from a person who is completely insensitive. I deplore his remarks,” Yashwant Sinha wrote on Twitter.

Calling it an “absolute failure of his leadership,” Ms Mirchandani says that Mr Modi, 70, should be held accountable for his inability to respond to the crisis in a timely manner.

“He is not just the prime minister of the BJP voter. He is the prime minister of 1.3-1.4 billion Indians that we are today. He owes us all an answer. Why are we in this situation? Why are people dying like flies? Why have the crematoriums shut their doors and bodies are being lined up on the streets?” she says.

Mr Modi and other senior figures in his administration have described the current crisis as a “storm” that no one could have expected or been prepared for, though experts have been warning of a second wave for some time. Shivam Shankar Singh, a former data analyst with the BJP and author of How to Win an Indian Election, feels that the government failed to predict the second wave for two possible reasons.

“One, they were too busy with the political campaigns to notice. Two, they believed it would pass, just like the first wave, so there was no need to raise doubts over an already declared victory,” he tells The Independent.

It was not until 20 April that Mr Modi addressed the nation on the raging cases as the international criticism on the handling of the pandemic mounted. “I can only surmise that when the global media began to pick up the story of the neglect of the government towards its people, that’s what forced him to come out,” says Ms Mirchandani.

Mr Singh feels that the prime minister’s silence was a strategic one, aimed at not just evading accountability but also crafting an image of himself as a trouble-shooting leader.

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“It is entirely possible the prime minister chose to continue campaigning so that he could wait out this period of absolute crisis, and come to the forefront only once things were better so that his image stayed associated with things improving instead of his brand getting associated with crisis, failure and panic,” says Mr Singh.

Signs of brewing anger against Mr Modi have been mounting online, with hashtags such as #ResignModi and #ModiMadeDisaster trending on Twitter and Facebook.

What’s less clear, however, is the political impact the crisis will have beyond the critical online community – Mr Modi’s base of support is massive, with his approval ratings at times topping 80 per cent, and he won the 2019 general election by a staggering landslide.

Mr Singh insists that even he cannot come away unscathed from a disaster of this scale, however. “His image and support have undoubtedly taken a major hit due to his handling of the second wave,” he says.

“What’s worse for [Modi] is that a lot of supporters of the BJP are also talking about the government’s failures because they are personally facing the consequences of the pandemic while the leaders they support continue to deny the crisis by claiming that there is no shortage of essential medication, oxygen and hospital beds,” says Mr Singh.

“[This] is antithetical to their own lived experience as they have to plead and run around all over looking for these essentials that are in short supply.”

West Bengal and several other election-going states and territories will deliver their results in just a few days, on 2 May, giving the first indications of whether the second wave has impacted the ruling party’s support. But if there is one thing to be learned from his tenure as India’s prime minister so far, it is that Mr Modi’s ability to endure should not be underestimated.