Up and down the Ganges, India's Modi enjoys support after 10 years of rule
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
The world's largest election is underway in India. Almost 1 billion people are eligible to vote - so many, the election is held on multiple days in different parts of India over many weeks. Prime Minister Narendra Modi of the Hindu nationalist party, BJP, is favored to win once votes are counted in early June. How is he on his way to a third term? NPR's Diaa Hadid takes us to a stretch of the Ganges River.
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DIAA HADID, BYLINE: Hindu priests perform a prayer to the Ganges River, waving fire to the water as the sun sets. Thousands cram on boats, clap and chant along. They come because this is Varanasi, a city holy to Hindus. It's also the constituency of the prime minister, Narendra Modi. He's not from here, but Varanasi is symbolically important to Modi because he's pledged to transform India into a Hindu nation, a sharp turn for a country that enshrines secularism and equality.
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HADID: Boats whir back to the riverbank. Tour guide Mahesh Banguru steps off a boat and tells us he wants to see Modi in power for as long as he lives.
MAHESH BANGURU: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: Banguru says Modi has given India back to Hindus after centuries of Muslim and British domination, like when Modi consecrated a temple dedicated to the Hindu deity Lord Ram in January. It was built on land where rioters destroyed a medieval mosque. Hindus believe it was built on the site of Lord Ram's birth. Banguru says, we Hindus waited hundreds of years for that, and we've even landed on the moon. That was in August, when India became the first country to land a rover near the lunar south pole. And so on up and down the riverbank - Modi's made cities cleaner and safer. He's not corrupt.
To make sense of this, we meet historian Dipak Malik. Malik says, first, Modi's popular because folks see that he gets things done - roads, airports, bridges. But there's also high inflation and...
DIPAK MALIK: Unemployment, high prices and this and that - all those things are there.
HADID: But it doesn't seem to stick. Malik says that's because Modi appeals to Hindu identity politics, like consecrating that temple to Lord Ram. Malik describes it as emotional sweeping.
MALIK: It takes away your breath.
HADID: Modi's helped along by India's entertainment and media industry, which largely cheerleads the prime minister. And Modi portrays himself as a benevolent father, governing alone. Modi's face is everywhere, including on some of the bags of free food staples given to some 800 million people. That's nearly two-thirds of India's population.
MALIK: That really matters. That matters.
HADID: We head to the nearby country town of Ghazipur.
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HADID: It's one of the few districts in northern India not governed by Modi's BJP. That could be changing. A woman in a red housecoat tells us people here regret not voting for the BJP last time.
KUMKUM RAI: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: Kumkum Rai says, "it's like we dropped an axe on our own foot." She says if the BJP comes, they'll build an airport, a university, better roads. Not everyone's convinced. We follow two BJP campaigners down a street, where they meet Phulmati. She's about 80. They produce a large sheet emblazoned with Modi's face. It lists dozens of government projects. The campaigners tick through it with Phulmati, checking what services she's received.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Non-English language spoken).
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Non-English language spoken).
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Non-English language spoken).
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: Does she receive free food staples? "Yes," she says, but adds, "I was struck off the list. I'm not getting any now."
PHULMATI: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: Another man interrupts to explain what Phulmati means.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: (Through interpreter) I voted for Modi, but I haven't really received benefits out of it.
HADID: She points at nearby trash in an open drain. Why hasn't Modi fixed that? The campaigners tell Phulmati it's not Modi's fault. But it's hard to convince her when Modi is portrayed as the answer to every problem.
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HADID: A few hours from Ghazipur, we head to a village called Chausa. We meet Shivanandum there. He's 80, has a few teeth, tattered clothes. He spends his days by the Ganges, waiting for families to bring the bodies of their loved ones. He conducts the last rites before their bodies are cremated on the riverbank. But during the pandemic, he says, for a few weeks, the bodies just washed up here.
SHIVANANDUM: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: Shivanandum says he doesn't know who they belong to. It seems families upstream rolled them into the water because they couldn't afford to cremate them. Officials dug mass graves for them. He waves to the grassy mounds around us. There they are. This happened after Modi announced his government had defeated the pandemic. Shivanandum says, "I can't forget what I saw."
SHIVANANDUM: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: But as for these elections, Shivanandum says, "I'll eat, then vote." It's another way to say he'll vote for whoever feeds him. Diaa Hadid, NPR News, Chausa.
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