Amid this ongoing national debate about Narendra Modi being a probable prime minister candidate for India, British PM David Cameron offered some lessons for Mr Modi when he regretted the Jallianwala Bagh massacre (though falling short of an apology). Does it mean that Cameron is personally guilty of what had happened in 1919? Does it lower his moral guard? I think not.

Without commenting upon the extent of his involvement in 2002 Godhra carnage, Mr Modi has to date not offered such a condolence to the people of India (forget about an apology). Rather he shied away from the same question during Karan Thapar's interview. Manmohan Singh after becoming the PM offered the same apology for 1984 riots. Did that mean that Singh had ordered those killings?

In a legitimately elected public office, this vicarious responsibility comes along for the person occupying that post. Even if not legally liable, any such person owes a moral responsibility to accept any act/abstention happening under his legitimate regime. Such rules of a moral conduct cannot be written down but need to come from within. This should be the true mark of a leader. German leaders till date apologise and regret for what had happened during holocaust. Does it mean that they are personally responsible for that? Accepted that the people in power are also human beings but their exalted power status has been granted on them by the people (technically if not realistically) which makes them responsible for all that is happening to the people who voted them into power, heedless of whether they caused those incidents or not. It is a case of moral contract with the populace and that should not be ignored ever.

I wish my innocent fellow Indians could have realised the ramifications of putting up such a person in that office. But the fault is just not his. Fault is ours as well. Our established institutions which only promote nepotism and reticence have not been able to produce or endorse any other alternative leader for this new India. It is a harsh reality that we today have a leadership deficit with no alternative and Modi is making the best out of this desperate situation. I must say this leadership deficit must not be an excuse to put up such a man in that high office. Creating new effective institutions which mentor new young leaders like all of us talking here will be a slow process and would take some time. In the meantime, we will have to find some workable alternatives. We owe a duty to create some genuine public opinions.

Modi's projection as a probable PM has happened due to a sustained media public opinion (nevertheless a media propaganda hyped by business houses is another reality behind this fact). Why can't we form a genuine public opinion to project Nitish Kumar as a potential PM candidate from NDA and AK Antony from UPA? Surely we can but we really need to get out of closets and think beyond what media wants us to think.

I fail to understand how Gujarat development story has got credited to Modi’s success account. Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and very lately Bihar have had much better economic as well as social indicators than Gujarat. Gujarat still lags behind all these states (ignore Bihar) in many of the social indicators like infant mortality, child malnutrition, poor-rich gap, farmer debt, female mortality, girl education, public health, etc. I fail to understand how media has chosen to ignore this side of the story.

Unfortunately, the Indian electorate today is highly energetic but at the same time highly ignorant of ground realities. The way media and people blame Manmohan Singh for present day's high inflation and economic downturn; they have over hyped the Gujarat's success story which in fact is very ordinary.

We must stop rating leaders by their face value. Modi's USP is his presentation skills and the way he interacts with the media and people. But "Symbolism without Substance is useless" and we need to go beyond this. I wish to ask if Modi can control inflation and build up investor confidence if he comes to power. Can he bring down India's fiscal deficit? Can he control the subsidy problem? A very honest answer would be "No". I will not call it his incapacity because it is beyond any rational human control. Today's economics is very much market driven and globally oriented. So, Modi or Rahul Gandhi, both will be rendered helpless. Unfortunately, none of them has talked about any of these issues.

It will be a betrayal of India's age old historical traditions of tolerance, humility and service if a man like Modi comes to power. He has never bowed down in respect of those who got tortured and killed. It reflects upon his rigid, extremist mentality (refusing to wear a skull cap was another reflection of this). In this leadership deficit, I would rather accept any ordinary leader than accepting such an extraordinary fundamentalist.

(With inputs from Shyama Kuriakose)