Narendra Modi is different – different, that is, from other Indian leaders.The man set to become prime minister of the world’s biggest democracy after the election victory of his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata party is nothing like his suave, metropolitan, English-educated predecessors from the Congress party. Nor does the barrel-chested and combative Mr Modi, from the relatively humble Ghanchi caste of vegetable-oil producers, resemble the gentlemanly Brahmin, Atal Behari Vajpayee, the only other BJP leader to have occupied the prime minister’s residence at 7 Race Course Road in New Delhi.
As a child, Mr Modi helped his father and uncle at their tea stalls in his home state of Gujarat in western India, became an activist for the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh – a rightwing group that fathered the BJP – and rose through a combination of ambition and organisational skill to become chief minister of Gujarat. He has held the post through successive state elections since 2001.
His ruthlessly efficient national election campaign, funded by big business and based more on the personality of Mr Modi than on the BJP’s anodyne manifesto, has taken India by storm. Enemies, as well as rivals in his party, have been left in disarray while the vocal Hindu men in their twenties and thirties who form the core of his support base are delighted.