The year 2019 was a mosaic of momentous events, framed between two episodes of violence: the bomb explosion with which it began and the protest marches, marked by arson and stone-pelting, with which it ended.
It was the year that India said “enough”. The jihadist violence that claimed the lives of 40 Indian soldiers in Pulwama met with an unprecedented response: for the first time since 1971, Indian warplanes crossed the Line of Control and bombed targets on foreign soil.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi proved the truth of the maxim “we have nothing to fear but fear itself” and was returned to power. It was the first time since Indira Gandhi that a sitting Prime Minister returned with a brute majority, one which enabled him to strip Jammu & Kashmir of its “special” status.
Political hubris got the better of Rahul Gandhi, who became the first Congress president since Independence to take responsibility for electoral reverses and quit his post. Sonia Gandhi stepped into the breach. The Congress recovered a measure of morale but lost the moral high ground in allying with the Shiv Sena, which it had once considered a Hindu fundamentalist party.
Hubris caught up with Amit Shah as well. Jilted by its oldest ally, the BJP lost its hold over Maharashtra, India's wealthiest state. Jharkhand, where it had broken with its ally, the AJSU, was the next to slip from the BJP's grasp. It retained Haryana only because it found a new friend in the JJP.
India reached for the Moon with Chandrayaan-2. It got there, only to have its lander crash on the lunar surface. Modi pulled ISRO chief K Sivan into a consolatory embrace and said, “The best is yet to come....we will reach newer heights of success”. Diplomacy reached new heights, too, with “Howdy Modi”, the first-ever joint rally by the US and Indian heads of state on American soil.
For the RSS, 2019 was its most triumphal year yet. Two critical items on its agenda were achieved, with the abrogation of Article 370 and the greenlighting of the Ram Temple by the Supreme Court. What's more, the Citizenship Amendement Act (CAA) resolved the status of “religious minority” refugees from neighbouring Islamic states, a long-pending issue.
If India showed its willingess to use hard power in Balakot, Pakistan fell back on soft power in Kartarpur. For the first time, it allowed Indian pilgrims visa-free access to the Kartarpur Sahib Gurudwara, to mark the 550th anniversary of Guru Nanak. With troubles at home, it didn't seem like a good idea to risk international opprobium by opening up a new front with India.
India's economy continued on a downward spiral, thanks in large measure to the banking crisis. Even as the Finance ministry struggled to bring down NPAs, new challenges emerged and the “twin balance sheet” problem morphed into the “four balance sheet” catastrophe. Growth numbers slid inexorably, as did GST collections. Economists shook their heads over belated efforts at economic stimulus and predicted a long and painful road to recovery.
The 150th year of Mahatma Gandhi, sadly, turned out to be a token exercise. The father of the nation was commemorated in all the standard ways – a walkathon here, a seminar there – but the message of non-violence was lost.
Just when it looked as if the police crackdown on lynching of alleged child-lifters, cow-killers and minorities was beginning to take effect, a series of terrifying rape-murders shook the country and dark memories of Nirbhaya came back to haunt the Parliament and the public.
The appetite for violence continued unabated at the end of the year, as “peaceful” rallies against the CAA and the NRC morphed into arson and stone-pelting. The government has backtracked on the NRC, but the CAA is a done deal and it has no option but to deal with the fallout in the years to come.
The upheavels of the year played out against the dark background of global warming. Forest fires unprecedented in size and scale raged across the world. Even as carbon dioxide levels reached a record 415 parts per million, the climate change talks in Madrid made little or no headway.
The challenges ahead are as varied as they are profound. The economy is not an easy fix and the socio-political churning requires delicate handling.
The writer is a senior journalist with 35 years of experience in working with major newspapers and magazines. She is now an independent writer and author.
