November 26, 2016 marks exactly two and a half years of the Narendra Modi government. In May 2014, on the same date, Modi took oath as the 15^th Prime Minister on the forecourt of the Rashtrapati Bhavan in a grand ceremony. The mood then was euphoric: the Sensex crossed the 25K mark, it was Rs 58 to a dollar and the gross domestic product (GDP) was set to gallop.

With 30 of his 60-month mandate over, things don’t look quite as rosy anymore. The rupee is touching new lows, the Sensex is more or less at the same level since 2014 and the GDP may contract thanks to demonetisation.

The halfway mark also is when the proverbial ulti ginti in an electoral cycle starts – now a politician has to start worrying about his policies from perspective of how they will impact his electoral fortunes as he returns to ask for votes.

Modi has started his countdown to 2019 with a massive gamble that could make or break him. Demonetisation as an idea is indeed a masterstroke – but the devil lies in the detail and its execution. The citizenry was never going into the economics of banning a currency or questioning just what percentage of currency is really ‘black’. For a vast majority of Indians, Modi was doing something to fight corruption and compared to Congress’s abject inability to stop scams – this is perhaps why the National Herald scam and Robert Vadra’s assets (and the Emergency) always get referenced by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spokespersons – Modi is already the winner.

Despite the long queues at the banks and people dropping dead, there is remarkable support for Modi on the issue. What could turn the tide against him, however, is not the faulty implementation but the kind of insensitivity with which the BJP is handling the cash crunch.

The number of changes in rules post-demonetisation are rivalling the inches that add up to the Prime Minister’s mythical chest. The Reserve Bank of India and the Finance Ministry seem to be not just on different pages, but reading different rulebooks. The citizenry is being bombarded with statements to the effect that all is well and there is always digital banking. People with no history of education or banking may brave hardships with a smile, but how do you supposed they’ll react to being told to eat cake when there is no bread around. Not to mention patchy network coverage and even patchier literacy rates.

But the BJP, it seems, has made it a policy to block out negative feedback and live in an echo chamber. It’s much touted #SurgicalStrike against Pakistan hasn’t yielded the desired results – with more than 20 soldiers dying after the strikes and a new Army Chief about to be appointed in Pakistan, tensions are set to escalate. Whipping up nationalist fervour, the BJP hasn’t bothered to explain just what led to Uri and Pathankot and whether there were internal failures on our part (there were). All questions to the government seem to be stonewalled on the pretext of How-Dare-You-Question-The-Army-You-Anti-National philosophy.

The arrogance of the BJP is also surprising given the fact that it has achieved precious little beyond creating new scandals and hashtags –#MakeInIndia, #DigitalIndia, #SwacchBharat, #StartUpIndia are catchy nomenclatures but haven’t created the impact that the packaging suggested. True, one can always blame the Congress for a sluggish start. However using that excuse past the halfway mark is going to be increasingly difficult.

What further exposes the arrogance and isolation of the government are the problems it didn’t inherit from the previous regime, namely #DalitDisquiet #GharWapsi #AwardWapsi #MoralPolicing #BeefBan #StudentAgitation. Despite having an opposition that has been virally comatose (or missing) for the last 2.5 years, there’s been a lot of negative press. However, the BJP seems to be arrogant enough to throw caution and balance to the wind and do as it pleases. The Prime Minister’s stoic silence on burning issues on multiple occasions may come back to haunt the BJP later – just like Vajpayee’s dithering in 2002 cost him in 2004’s general elections.

It’s true that BJP has Big Media dancing to its tunes – but if media management really worked in the hustings, Vajpayee would never have lost 2004 and the ‘India Shining’ campaign would have become a playbook on how to win elections. Sadly for them, ‘India Shining’ was a joke to a large section of the electorate. A similar blunder may well be underway with demonetisation, where plastic money and PayTM is being talked of in a country where the bulk of the citizenry depends on and is comfortable with physical money.

Such rash push-announcements for ‘greater good’ that causes ‘temporary pain’ may sound good at first but as the sterilisation drive under Sanjay Gandhi showed, the greater good of the masses cannot be dictated to the masses. Force it upon the public, and the public usually finds a way to bite you back.

Power alienates you from the ground and power brings in arrogance. Congress did this by embracing a deadly coterie culture, and BJP is doing the same, with just more brazenness and a different shade of arrogance and self-righteousness.

With a charismatic leader and comatose opposition, the BJP’s attitude seems to be working for now. In the long run, however, will the BJP discover that people value respect more than #ShiningIndia or #MakeInIndia?