Respect, endurance, perseverance, resilience, knowledge, rand wisdom that’s what anchored and moulded India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
All those qualities propelled Modi to usher India into the global spotlight which earned the country a title of being one of the fastest-growing economies in the world.
With Modi’s intelligence and leadership qualities, he has evidently grew the country’s services exports from $53 billion (R965bn) to $338bn between 2005 and 2023 and almost double the rate of the rest of the world, attempting to form nearly a tenth of the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
With this trajectory, economic experts believe that India’s services exports to touch 11% of GDP by 2030, and to be valued at around $800bn.
According to reports, given Modi’s acumen, he initially kicked off India’s services exports on the back of “offshoring” as a measure for a cost-saving in which global companies outsourced their back-office operations to units in India.
As expected, these units have grown increasingly specialised and moved up the value chain over the past decade.
These units are now called “Global Capability Centres (GCC) and are based overwhelmingly in India’s major cities, which support a variety of business processes, such as IT, finance, human resources, and analytics.
It is said that the revenues of Indian GCCs have quadrupled over the last 13 years, to $46bn in the 2023 fiscal year. The number of GCCs has more than doubled from 700 to 1 580 in that period, and the sector has added around 1.3 million employees, taking the total employee headcount to 1.7 million in the 2023 fiscal year.
His qualification as a political science graduate has helped him mingle with his constituencies and that also made him popular among colleagues and more influential in the BRICS community.
Modi’s staunch adherence to religion also played a pivotal role in shaping and turning him into one of the world’s most popular leaders.
In the past months, we have seen him criss-crossing his country canvassing people of India to rally behind his leadership. That sees him being poised to win another majority and extend his decade-long hold on power.
It’s not doubt that he will come back as India’s prime minister. His leadership has helped transform India into one of the fastest-growing economies.
In his Independence Day speech, Modi announced that his government had set a target of providing electricity to 18 000 villages which were still in darkness after almost deven decades of independence.
He further committed that all remaining villages shall be electrified within 1 000 days.
“Rural electrification is happening at a rapid pace, and is being done in an unbelievably transparent manner
“Data on villages being electrified is available to the public through a mobile app and a web dashboard. While we can observe electricity reaching the villages,” he said.
Modi, 73, would be the second of India’s prime ministers to secure the three-term record after the country’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru.
BJP party has become the first party to win clear majorities since Congress in the 1984 elections.
Modi is possibly the only leader to claim mass appeal almost throughout India since Indira Gandhi, who was murdered in 1984.
According to reports, BJP’s electoral fortunes are linked to Modi's charisma, adept use of religious polarisation and assertive Hindu nationalism, coupled with a record of effective governance. Factors like caste, identity and a slew of welfare programmes have also contributed to his support.