‘A regime contemptuous of checks and balances’: Rajdeep Sardesai on the first year of Modi 2.0
An excerpt from Rajdeep Sardesai’s new ‘Afterword’ to his book ‘2019: How Modi Won India’. Sanjaay Kanojia/AFP
If a week is a long time in Indian politics, a year can be an eternity. The first anniversary celebrations of the Narendra Modi 2.0 government in May 2020 had none of the “band, baaja, baarat” razzmatazz that is such an intrinsic part of the Modi style of political marketing. India was in lockdown mode and the rising cases of Covid-19 across the country meant that public celebrations would not be possible.