By the end of the year, with Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh elections, India will begin a relentless 18-month steeplechase to the 2019 Lok Sabha contest. The budget of 2018 will be an election year budget. While Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley have been careful and principled in avoiding populist and profligate spending and in adhering to a strict fiscal consolidation since 2014, to what degree and in what manner the fiscal discipline of four years will be deployed in a election year remains an intriguing question.

It is important to see Modi’s speech in Parliament on Feb 7,in this context rather than just limit to immediate concerns about addressing voters in UP and Uttarakhand for that matter. In a sense he was setting the agenda or, testing the waters, for a phase beyond March 11.

This explained why, for instance, he referred to largely the Congress, rather than other opposition parties. The Prime Minister mentioned to the Congress’ Lok Sabha leader Mallikarjun Kharge, by name—as is appropriate in Parliamentary debate, where the leader of the government responds to criticism by leader of the opposition. He also had a dig at Rahul Gandhi and dynastic politics that is both the Congress’ principal vulnerability and ultimate calling card.

Why did Modi do this? Does it suggest new tack of as Congress enthusiasts fantasize, a recognition that Rahul Gandhi and his party pose a massive political threat? The answer may be a trifle more nonsensical. If one moves from the current quintet of state elections, then every set of major assembly polls coming up – Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh at the end of 2017, Karnataka in early summer of 2018 and Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh in winter 2018--posits the BJP against the Congress.

Second, Modi has long believed voters make rational choices that are rooted in real-life experiences, rather than abstraction. They tend to compare—or subliminally factor in—the record of an incumbent government against that of its immediate predecessor. This is not always the case, of course, and occasionally other motivations and emotions can sway a mandate. Yet, the Prime Minister’s political logic cannot be altogether dismissed.

As such, in the run up to the 2019 general election, Modi will need to emphasize his personal popularity and credence – and there is no doubt these remain high, as a variety of opinion polls and anecdotal evidence will suggest – but also how his government has done in comparison to the UPA administration, particularly UPA-II (2009-14).

In this regard, PM’s speech was telling. Some of the comparison was straightforward and numerical. The incremental growth in highway capacity, railway track upgrade, the power sector, and building houses for poorest sections of the society. Some of it was also a response to those, among them BJP supporters, who contend his government has not done enough to take on the culture of corruption that marked the UPA’s decline.

Modi sought to place the battle against corruption in a broader and deeper context. He referred to demonetisation as one of the series of steps taken against tax avoidance and promised harsher steps in the days ahead. He stressed the attempts at cleaning up subsidy circus and mess that welfare spending has been reduced to, with benefit not reaching those who need them and intermediaries enriching themselves. (IPA Service)