Grand Tamasha

EAM Subrahmanyam Jaishankar stopped at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on the first day of his whirlwind trip through Washington, DC. We were lucky enough to record the conversation, which was hosted by Carnegie President William J. Burns, and Ashley J. Tellis. Today we're sharing the minister's remarks in full, along with a selection of the questions we thought Grand Tamasha listeners might be most interested in. The video of the full event will be available on our website in the coming days, and we'll update this description when it's posted.

On this week’s podcast, Milan sits down with Grand Tamasha regulars Sadanand Dhume of the American Enterprise Institute and Wall Street Journal and Tanvi Madan of the Brookings Institution to round up the latest news on Indian politics and policy.

The two begin by dissecting the massive, 50,000 person “Howdy, Modi” rally held over the weekend at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas. They discuss the optics, the significance, Trump’s role, and the key takeaways from Modi’s address. Later on the podcast, the three talk about the ongoing lockdown in the state of Jammu and Kashmir and the BJP’s endgame in the contested state. Milan, Sadanand, and Tanvi conclude with an assessment of the Indian government’s measures to shore up the flagging Indian economy.

Milan speaks with Prashant Jha, opinion editor at the Hindustan Times and author of the book, How the BJP Wins: Inside India’s Greatest Election Machine. So many election analysts, journalists, and political scientists failed to predict the massive mandate that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) claimed in the 2019 general election. This has prompted a good deal of soul-searching as to why. In this conversation, Prashant—who was one of the few who picked up on the pro-Modi wave during the campaign—explains why so many election observers missed the writing on the wall.

Milan also speaks with Prashant about the current state of the BJP, the induction of BJP president Amit Shah into the government, what ails the Congress Party, and what could upset the BJP’s current electoral dominance.

Milan speaks with Niha Masih of the Washington Post about the ongoing political drama surrounding the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam. Nearly 33 million residents of Assam applied to have their names included on the register, which was intended to distinguish between who was a legitimate resident of the state of the Assam and who was an illegal migrant from Bangladesh. When the list finally came out in late August, nearly 2 million people discovered that their names were left off the list--calling their citizenship status into question.

Niha recently spent time on the ground in Assam and she and Milan discuss the history of the NRC process, its contested implementation, and the political color it has taken on in recent years. The two also debate the political implications of the registry for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the fate of the millions whose names did not appear on the revised list.

Last week on the podcast, Milan talked with journalist Rahul Pandita about the Indian government’s decision to abrogate Article 370 of the Constitution, which grants the state of Jammu and Kashmir semi-autonomous status. According to Rahul, while many Kashmiris are up in arms over the government’s decision, many residents quietly support the move.

This week, we continue our exploration of the events unfolding in Jammu and Kashmir by speaking with Salman Soz, who offers a very different perspective on the actions on the ground. Soz is an international development expert who hails from Kashmir and a member of the opposition Indian National Congress. He is also the author of a new book, The Great Disappointment: How Narendra Modi Squandered a Unique Opportunity to Transform the Indian Economy.

Salman believes the scrapping of Article 370 will have serious, adverse consequences for the state and for Indian democracy on the whole. Milan and Salman discuss the latter’s personal ties to the state, when a return to “normalcy” might be possible, whether Article 370 can be linked to the state’s troubles, and what state politics looks like in the future.

Milan sits down with journalist Rahul Pandita to talk about the situation in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Rahul has an intense personal connection to the state—he was just fourteen years old when he and his Kashmiri Pandit family were forced into exile. He speaks with Milan about a recent reporting trip he took to Kashmir in the aftermath of the government’s decision to abrogate Article 370 of the Constitution, ending seven decades of constitutional autonomy for the state.

Milan and Rahul discuss the fall-out of the government’s move, the contradictory narratives from the ground, and the prospects for violence. Rahul also explains his frustration with mainstream media’s “apocalyptic” reporting from Kashmir, which he says fails to adequately report all sides of the story.

Rahul documented the heartbreaking story of Kashmir and his connection to it in his 2013 book, Our Moon Has Blood Clots: A Memoir of a Lost Home in Kashmir. Today, Rahul is a journalist with OPEN Magazine.

This week on the Grand Tamasha podcast, we bring you some special bonus content--a conversation Milan recorded with political scientist Christophe Jaffrelot in June 2019 in the aftermath of the momentous Indian general election. Christophe is one of the world’s best-known scholars of India, having written some of the field’s foundational texts dissecting caste politics and Hindu nationalism.

In his conversation with Milan, Christophe discusses the factors that led to the BJP’s crushing victory in the 2019 election, starting with the magnetic charisma and “national populism” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The two also debate the long-term implications of the election for the construction of a Hindu rashtra (nation), the future of secularism, and what the election portends for the future shape of politics in India’s south.

In the season premiere, Milan hosts an end-of-summer news round-up with Sadanand Dhume of the American Enterprise Institute and Wall Street Journal and Tanvi Madan of the Brookings Institution.

Milan and his guests discuss three topics: the Modi government’s decision to abrogate Section 370 of the Indian Constitution granting semi-autonomous status to Jammu and Kashmir, the slumping Indian economy, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Independence Day address.

Programming note: this season we're changing up our format to allow us to dig deeper into the issues you care about. Each episode will either break down the news of the week, or feature an interview with an expert. Thanks for listening!

First, Milan sits down with Richard (Rick) Rossow who holds the Wadhwani Chair in U.S.-India Policy Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington. With years of experience in the private sector as well as in the think tank world, Rick follows India’s trade and investment scenario India more closely than almost anyone else on the planet. Rick and Milan discuss the recent trade fallout between the United States and India and whether we are at the beginning of an ugly trade war. Rick and his colleagues have also been tracking the Modi government’s economic reforms through a unique reforms scorecard, and Rick tells us about what we can expect from Modi 2.0 based on the experience of Modi 1.0.

Then, Milan sits down with Shereen Bhan, Managing Editor of CNBC-TV18, during her recent trip to Washington. Shereen has a front-row seat when it comes to Indian economic news, and she and Milan have a wide-ranging conversation on everything from India’s contested GDP numbers to private sector sentiment. Shereen also discusses the Modi government’s reform agenda, the road ahead for the Goods and Services Tax (GST), and questions around India’s trade policy.

First, Milan sits down with Uttam Kumar of the Hindustan Times to discuss the state of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on the heels of its second consecutive election victory. Uttam and Milan discuss the role that Amit Shah, the longtime confidant of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and newly inaugurated Union Home Minister, will play in the Modi 2.0 government. Uttam also shares his insights into the future of the BJP party organization, the makeup of the Cabinet, and the government’s early priorities.

Then, Milan talks with Ashley J. Tellis, who holds the Tata Chair for Strategic Affairs at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Milan asks Ashley about the foreign policy challenges facing the new government, as laid out in Tellis’ new Carnegie essay, “Troubles Aplenty: Foreign Policy Challenges for the Next Indian Government.” Tellis also assesses Modi’s first-term foreign policy record and the current turmoil in U.S.-India relations. Milan ends the conversation by asking Tellis to reflect on Modi’s choice of Dr. S. Jaishankar as the new External Affairs Minister.