Tall order?

Last month, well before the headline-grabbing Goa meeting of the Bharatiya Janata Party that catapulted him centre stage, Narendra Modi addressed the Indian Merchants' Chamber in Mumbai. He was in form. He told the 7,000-strong audience crammed into an auditorium meant for 2,000 that he had requested the prime minister to start a Mumbai-Ahmedabad Metro and also build a Statue of Unity to commemorate Sardar Patel, who had united India. The statue, he said, must be double the height of the Statue of Liberty in the US. Somebody from the audience said people wanted to see Modi in Delhi (as prime minister). He did not demur, merely replying that his priority was to reach Ahmedabad before nightfall...