Addressing the nation during Diwali this weekend Narendra Modi paid homage to Indira Gandhi, the prime minister who imposed a state of emergency in India in the mid-1970s, the closest the world’s largest democracy has come to authoritarianism. Mr Modi also mentioned the highly polarising religious dispute over the Ayodhya site, where Hindus destroyed in 1992 a mosque they believed stood on the birthplace of Lord Ram.
Both remarks were standard fare for an Indian prime minister with strongman tendencies who this year rode a wave of Hindu majoritarianism to win a second term. But absent from the address was something more pressing for investors and most ordinary Indians — just how serious is the malaise affecting India’s economy and what is Mr Modi doing about it?
That the Indian economy is facing a sharp slowdown is by now well known. Gross domestic product is growing at a six-year low of 5 per cent, down from a heady pace of 8 per cent as recently as the middle of the year. Unemployment is rising, from around 6 per cent in August last year to nearly 9 per cent in mid-October, according to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, a research group.