Modi, Narendra Damodardas
Modi, Narendra Damodardas
(närĕn`drä dämōdärdäs` mōdē), 1950–, Indian politician. A member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a right-wing, paramilitary Hindu nationalist group and then, from 1987, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata partyBharatiya Janata party[Hindi,=Indian People's party] (BJP), Indian political party that espouses Hindu nationalism. The BJP draws its Hindu nationalist creed from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS; National Self-Service Organization), a group founded in 1925 in opposition to
..... Click the link for more information. (BJP), he rose to prominence in his native Gujarat, serving as BJP general secretary for Gujarat (1988–95); he subsequently became BJP national secretary (1995–98) and general secretary (1998–2001). In 2001 he was appointed chief minister for Gujarat; the next year the Gujarat BJP was accused of responding inadequately to and sometimes condoning deadly anti-Muslim riots there. Modi resigned and new elections were called; the BJP subsequently won, and won again in 2007 and 2012. Modi's government emphasized Gujarat's economic development. In 2013 he became the BJP's prime-ministerial candidate for the 2014 national elections, and the became prime minister after the BJP and its allies won control of parliament. Modi's tenure as prime minister was marked by 2018 by a return to populist and protectionist economic policies favored by farmers and merchants aligned with the BJP, while his governing style was seen as increasingly centralized and autocratic, often challenging the independence of nonpolitical government institutions.