How Modi ensures headlines

A senior correspondent of a leading Gujarati daily was once asked by the management to secure the presence of the then Chief Minister Narendra Modi as the guest of honour at a function of the media group. The daily, however, had carried reports critical of the CM.

So, when the journalist met Narendra Modi, he smirked and let the matter rest. On the anointed day, a rival newspaper received a request from the CMO that the Chief Minister wanted to join the editor/proprietor of the newspaper for a cup of tea.

The Chief Minister arrived, spent some time and left leaving the host guessing the purpose of the Chief Minister’s visit. But those aware of Modi’s mind knew that it was meant to convey his displeasure to the media group whose request to attend the function he had ignored.

A variation of the same ‘technique’ was used to convey similar sentiments and make a nationally powerful media group fall in line in New Delhi after he became Prime Minister.

Narendra Modi is credited with inside knowledge of the innards of the media industry, its intracacies, inter-personal rivalries, stakeholders, balance sheets and even details of the beats. Having developed the habit of reading newspapers thoroughly, he is said to know the working of the newsrooms, deadlines and the working cycle better than some, if not most, journalists.

He is also known to play one media house against the other. He drove a wedge between the Gujarati media and the English media in the state. Once he became the CM, accreditation cards of all journalists were cancelled, and renewal was initially done on a quarterly basis and later on a six-monthly basis.

This continued for months. A different set of curbs were imposed on newspapers, more so those who were critical of the establishment with their circulation coming under scrutiny through the electricity bills of their printing presses.

The task of selection of newspapers and periodicals for release of advertisements was taken over by the CMO and cleared by the boss himself, particularly when it came to high profile events like the bi-annual Global Gujarat investors summit. The special supplements that news publications brought out countrywide on such occasions, had a high premium on advt-news linkages and had media houses crawling when asked to bend.

The Modi government, in fact created a parallel channel for disseminating news. An audio-visual division of the information department churned out CDs of government ‘news’ which were distributed every week through local cable networks right up to the grassroot level. Even the timings were fixed by the CMO and it just required the local cop to ensure its implementation.

One of the highest circulated Gujarati newspapers which had been critical of the government one day found to its horror that the newspaper was carrying pullouts laudatory of the establishment. The pullouts were printed using the same type and font as the newspaper.

His news management skills were phenomenal. When Modi became CM in October, 2011, there were barely three months to go before the first anniversary of the devastating earthquake that hit the state in 2000. One of the reasons he was brought in was because of widespread dissatisfaction over relief and rehabilitation work. Things were in a bad shape and newspapers were critical.

But in three months, Modi managed the media. A publicity blitz, an advertisement campaign was unleashed and newsmen favoured. Those who proved to be less obliging were replaced by journalists flown in from all corners of the country. Things dramatically changed and media reported the transformation. 80,000 houses had been built or repaired, they claimed.

In 2005, Modi performed puja at a state organised function in Siddhpur, where the Narmada waters were diverted to revive the mythical Saraswati river. Lakhs of people were brought from all over the state to the venue where religious heads consecrated the revival of the ‘Saraswati’ and thousands jumped into the puddle to carry home the dirty water which became sacred.

But in December 2014 after Modi became the PM, Rajya Sabha MP Dilip Pandya, who belongs to Siddhpur, received a letter from the Union government that there was no plan to develop the river at Sidhpur!

International communication consultant APCO handled the publicity of the Global Gujarat Investors summit. Though a cost-benefit analysis of these summits will be possible only if and when a non-BJP government comes to power in the state, many Gujaratis believe that bi-annual publicity blitzkrieg helped Modi more than Gujarat.

After Modi left for Delhi, the media breathed more easily but the carrot and stick policy of the state government continued. The PMO still maintains a hawk like vigil on the media in the Prime Minister’s home state.

Modi took Jagdish Thakkar, PRO in the Chief Minister’s Office to the PMO when he moved to Delhi. Thakkar is perhaps the only state information department officer who joined the CMO during Chimanbhai Patel’s time and has been retained by Modi, even post his retirement. He is Modi’s eyes and ears in the Gujarati media.