Indian Prime Minister Modi’s final campaign message to his supporters: ‘God sent me’

CNN
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Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has a new message to send to his supporters on the campaign trail: God has chosen him.

“I am convinced that God sent me for a purpose, and when that purpose is accomplished, my work will be finished,” he told local news channel NDTV in an interview last week. “That is why I dedicated myself to God.”

Modi continued: “God does not reveal his cards. He keeps making me do things.

Since coming to power in 2014, Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have promoted vehement Hindu nationalism in a country where around 80% of the population adheres to the polytheistic faith.

And although he has used such language in the past, his message that he is a leader chosen by God has become much more evident in his bid to win a third consecutive five-year term in power.

Throughout India’s mammoth weeks of national elections, the results of which will be declared on June 4, Modi has given numerous media interviews and speeches that echo comments made to NDTV.

He adopted the persona of an openly pious Hindu, said Subir Sinha, director of the South Asia Institute at SOAS University of London. This, he added, “rallied his base who feel proud of such religiosity”.

India is a deeply religious country. But historically, its post-independence leaders have remained publicly secular, in part to avoid appearing to pander to either side in a nation with a long history of interfaith violence.

“(He is) the first prime minister, they say, who is not ashamed of this faith,” Sinha said.

When he first ran for office a decade ago, Modi chose Varanasi, India’s spiritual capital, as his constituency, making the ancient city the ideal setting for merging his religious ambitions and policies.

“Mother Ganga called me to Varanasi,” Modi said at the time, referring to the sacred river Ganges, considered the body of the Hindu deity Ganga by many followers of the faith.

Standing on its banks earlier this month, Modi made another reference to his perceived divinity.

“Until my mother was alive, I had believed that my birth may have been biological,” Modi told CNN affiliate CNN News-18. “But after his death, when I look at my life experiences, I am convinced that God sent me here.”

God, Modi said, made him “nothing but an instrument”.

Modi’s greatest display of divinity came in January this year, when he dedicated the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, a controversial Hindu temple built on the site of a destroyed mosque.

Billboards celebrating the temple’s opening featured an image of the Hindu deity Ram next to Modi’s face, with his BJP leader even dubbing the prime minister “the king of gods.”

Modi fasted for 11 days in a cleansing ritual before the event and visited temples across the country, performing the sacramental customs of India’s majority faith. He publicly called himself an “instrument” of Lord Ram, chosen by the divine to “represent all the people of India”.

At the consecration, Modi presided over the ‘Pran Pratishtha’ – the unveiling of the much-awaited Ram idol – taking on a role usually reserved for priests.

During the election, Modi also sparked a hate speech row by accusing Muslims – who have been part of India for centuries – of being “infiltrators”, echoing a false conspiracy expressed by some Hindu nationalists claim that Muslims are displacing the country’s Hindu population. by deliberately having large families.

It sparked widespread anger among Muslim leaders and opposition politicians and called for election authorities to investigate. BJP party spokespersons later said Modi was talking about undocumented migrants. The Election Commission has asked the BJP to respond to the allegations.