The invocation of ‘55 years of Congress rule’, to counter any valid criticism of the current governments, is absurd. The purpose of conducting elections every five years is to judge the performance of an incumbent government. Congress formed governments, by winning 10 out of 16 general elections, through people’s mandate. They also paid the price, electorally and personally, then and there, for their actions and failures.

The important point is that any party’s rule must be judged with respect to its PM/CM, rather than the total years of a party’s rule. Congress didn’t pursue policies monotonously in its 55 years of rule. Neither has BJP in its 10 years of rule. The governance style and policies underwent drastic changes under different PMs of the same party.

The protectionist economic policy of Nehru was dismantled by his grandson Rajiv, and the economy was ultimately liberalised by PV Narasimha Rao, which illustrates the radical shift of economic policies under different PMs of the same party.

The Emergency was imposed by the daughter of a great democrat, Nehru, who painstakingly established and nurtured the institutions of democracy. The military, which suffered a humiliating defeat against China during the Nehru era, achieved a decisive victory of the millennium under Indira Gandhi.

The economy, which registered a decadal growth of 3-5% under Congress PMs of the pre-liberalisation era, recorded the highest decadal growth of 7.7% and the highest GDP growth of 10.26% under the recent Congress PM Manmohan Singh.

Among BJP leaders, Vajpayee was a democrat who had a good working relationship with the Opposition, while Modi is antithetical to the Opposition. Vajpayee believed in dialogue with stakeholders of Kashmir, while Modi believes in a muscular militaristic approach.

An underperforming government shouldn’t be shown any sympathy, on the basis of leaders’ rhetoric or sentimental speeches, during elections. Voting out governments that don’t perform or fail to keep up their promises will increase the accountability of leaders, and in turn, will bring true prosperity and development.