A MANDATE FOR CONSTITUTION AND CONSENSUS

SOME are destroyed by defeat, and some are made small and mean by victory.

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Greatness lives in one who triumphs equally over defeat and victory. The great American writer John Steinbeck couldn't have imagined how accurate he would be in describing the result of the latest general election in India. Prime Minister Narendra Modi created history by becoming the second political leader after Jawaharlal Nehru to be sworn in as prime minister of the world's largest democracy for a third consecutive term. He is the first genuinely non-Congress leader to the enviable feat. He is also the second RSS swayamsevak after Atal Bihari Vajpayee to lead the nation since independence.

Yet, there is an arithmetical distinction between Nehru and Modi. While the Congress under Nehru won the three Lok Sabha elections in 1952, 1957 and 1962 with almost two-thirds majorities, the BJP captured power with the help of its allies alone, it couldn't conjure up the majority figure of 272 seats on the third attempt. Nevertheless, the hurriedly-stitched pre-poll National Democratic Alliance (NDA) triumphantly returned to Raisina Hill under Modi's leadership with just under 300 seats. Modi's idea of political India has survived, slightly modified by voters. For now. For thriving in the future, he bowed before the Constitution before getting formally elected as the leader of the NDA.