No one's buying the Modi-fied GDP

On Thursday and Friday one lakh farmers from around the country gathered in Delhi to raise awareness of their problems all manifestations of the agricultural distress resulting from the boneheaded November 2016 demonetisationThey demanded a three week session of Parliament to discuss their issues the two most pressing being the farm loans problem whose repayment has driven many an unable farmer to suicide and crop prices where the government keeps tackling the symptom mdash by raising the Minimum Support Price MSP applicable to 22 crops which cures nothing since much agricultural produce is sold in the open market not subject to MSP mdash instead of the disease itself which includes a heavily and unnecessarily regulated farm sector Even crop insurance announced with much fanfare has turned out to be a scam that favours insurersIt was an impressive and peaceful gathering despite its underreporting by Indiarsquos electronic mediaIndeed these news channels were focused on matters like Ayodhya where on November 25 a lakh were expected in support of the Vishwa Hindu Parishadrsquos VHP increasing pressure on the government to start construction of a Ram Temple only 30000 showed up Similarly with the 26th anniversary of the Babri Masjid demolition around the corner the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh RSS organised a Sankalp Yatra in Delhi on Saturday but less than a 100 people turned up Now ask yourself whether the agricultural crisis or the Ram Temple ought to be prioritised by the government The answer depends on December 11 when the votes to the five Assembly elections are countedInstead this flailing government spends time not on creative solutions to the approaching global economic slowdown mdash trade barriers and interest rates are going up while the big economies are expected to cool down mdash but on cooking its numbersIn 2015 the government introduced a new method of calculating the countryrsquos Gross Domestic Product GDP which showed the country under Prime Minister Narendra Modi growing at over seven per cent the highest of big economies in the world The new method meant a recalculation of GDP numbers when Dr Manmohan Singh was PM In July that lsquo back seriesrsquo was provisionally calculated and it turned out that growth touched double digits under Dr Singh so the government immediately withdrew those numbersThe final numbers emerged last week showing that the Modi years produced higher growth than the Manmohan Singh years Though this did not sync with various markers mdash for instance cars sales grew 138 per cent from 2004 2012 but only 11 per cent during the Modi years mdash it was fiercely defended by the Niti Aayog Who knows what the Aayogrsquos members truly feel given that former Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian after two years of service to Modi last week called demonetisation a ldquo massive draconian monetary shockrdquo Yes hersquos an opportunist given that his book is publishing this month but such opportunism characterises the members of this administration Ironically during this controversy and while the foremost economic journals in the world were laughing at us the latest quarterrsquos GDP dropped to 61 per cent So much for acche dinNo wonder then that Modi typically chose not to bravely face the farmers for he knew that bragging about how his GDP had been better than that under Manmohan Singh was not going to impress anyone especially not farmers who got a Rs 60000 crore loan waiver 10 years ago As Arun Shourie said this government does not know how to manage the economy so it manages headlines instead and thatrsquos what the new GDP lsquo back seriesrsquo is meant forInstead Modi fled Delhi and hightailed it to Argentina to attend the G 20 summit and inflict on the world another of his puerile acronyms in this case JAI for Japan America IndiaOne of the alarming aspects of this summit was how Modi among other blowhard strongmen happily stood for a photo op with Saudi crown prince Mohd bin Salman who has been accused by his closest allies and the rest of the world of murdering a Saudi journalist in his countryrsquos mission in Istanbul Turkey in September Perhaps Modi supports this After all it is the followers of Modi who murdered journalist Gauri Lankesh a year earlierAnd while the two media hating strongmen held hands news emerged of how a journalist in Manipur was arrested for a Facebook post in which he called his state chief minister Modirsquos ldquo puppetrdquo He was arrested under the National Security Act of all things The court gave him bail but the state administration promptly rearrested himItrsquos a wonder that neither the farmers nor Arvind Subramanian were arrested under the NSA since their opinions also amount to criticism of Modi For nowadays to ask about the much promised but elusive achhe din is a threat to national securityModi would rather flaunt cooked up GDP numbers in Argentina than face debtridden farmers who are unlikely to believe his claims of achhe din No wonder that Modi typically chose not to bravely face the farmers for he knew that bragging about how his GDP had been better than that under Manmohan Singh was not going to impress anyone especially not farmers who got a Rs 60000 crore loan waiver 10 years agoAditya Sinharsquos latest book The Spy Chronicles RAW ISI and the Illusion of Peace cowritten with AS Dulat and Asad Durrani is available nowHe tweets autumnshade Send your feedback to mailbag midday comThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper