Around early 2013, the then Chief Minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi, gave a clairon call that was a precursor to his national campaign. ‘Minimum Government, Maximum Governance’ was the Chief Minister’s aspiration amd ambition for the country while challenging the administrative status quo under the Congress.

More than a decade later, a western variation of ‘minimum government and maximum governance’ is making news, from the United States of America. Under President Donald Trump, the newly introduced Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will be lead by Elon Musk. The idea is to bring down the cost of governance and eliminate branches of the government that are either redundant or obsolete.

On the inaugural day earlier this week, Trump went on an executive order spree, prompting an inevitable comparison between him and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on social media. Many, rather naively, questioned why couldn’t the Prime Minister usher the same efficiency in the governance process in India in the last decade. A classic case of much ado without complete knowledge.

When it comes to India, the monetary aspect in governance efficiency becomes imperative. One can recall the infamous comment of Rajiv Gandhi, India’s former Prime Minister, who remarked about the lost 85 paise for every rupee that left the government treasury for the utility of the people. For decades, monetary leakages and losses have plagued governance in India.

The Modi Government was quick to fix this problem via two routes. Firstly, the JAM trinity, which ensured a bank account for over 50 Crore people through the Jan Dhan Yojana, linked to their Aadhaar cards and their mobile numbers. Taking the middlemen out of the equation in India’s villages, the government introduced Aadhaar-enabled payment system.

However, the JAM trinity revolutionised welfare execution as direct benefit transfers (DBTs) became the new norm. Since 2014, over 300 welfare schemes, worth more than Rs. 41 Lakh Crore, has been transferred to the beneficiaries,

and because of the digitisation, redundancy in beneficiaries’ has been taken care of, further saving the government almost Rs. 3.48 Lakh Crore.

The government efficiency was visible during the pandemic, when the DBT mechanism ensured middlemen were not robbing the economically weaker sections and lower income groups of their rights. Even during the vaccination drive, the CoWIN platform aided the cause of a billion people, has people only had to rely on Aadhaar and the linked mobile number for their digital certificates. On the contrary, in America, people were struggling with paper certificates to prove their vaccination credentials.

The permanent digitisation structures have eliminated the middlemen and lowered the costs in welfare. However, they have aided the cause of financial inclusion as well.

With the account aggregator framework of the Reserve Bank of India, credit access has already been moved to paperless format, eliminating redundancy and delays for the borrowers. The prospects for microfinance, where borrowers running small businesses can now avail loans worth a few thousand rupees for one day or one week, have improved. The same process has aided the growth of MUDRA programme, Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), and Self-Help Groups (SHGs) in India’s villages.

Through the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) online trade has moved from a platform-centric model to a transaction-centric model, giving India’s young MSMEs more control over their monetary interests in their online pursuits. They are no longer reliant on western platforms, when it comes to booking profits or sharing commissions.

With undertakings like the Government e-marketplace and eNAM (National Agriculture Market), procurement and marketing of critical products have also been streamlined.

The digitisation has opened up new avenues for street vendors via the SVANidhi programme. Through Svamitva programme, the government is now aiding the digitisation of land records, thus positively aggravating their economic value and utility. This list is endless, but the bottomline is that

through digitisation, problems that plagued India’s governance for decades, are now history; done and dusted. All inside the ten years of Modi Government.

The long-term asset creation must also be viewed from the lens of governance efficiency. Instead of languishing against prolonged poverty in India’s villages in the name of political philosophy, the government has opted for overall comprehensive development.

From gas cylinders to proper houses, from toilets to tap water connections, and from healthcare initiatives to local infrastructure, this physical asset creation complements the digital public infrastructure, thus enabling a billion people in villages to escape the vicious loop of poverty they were trapped in for decades since independence.

Pre-2014, India’s banking sector was in an irreversible peril. Non-performing assets (NPAs) were piling up, thus ushering the Twin Balance Sheet problem that were hindering credit expansion and growth, both to priority sectors and other enterprises.

Starting 2016, the government took control, brining down the NPAs through an agile amalgamation of policy fixes. Eventually, with the introduction of Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, the exit process for the businesses was made easier.

The most critical example of ushering government efficiency can perhaps be seen in Jammu and Kashmir, where the revocation of Article 370 and Article 35A have enhanced governance, ensured socio-economic integration, and eliminated the decades-old bargaining chip of the separatist elements and a few regional parties.

Efficiency in governance is not about signing multiple orders can be overturned by the next President, as many Trump supporters would have realised after 2017, but about erecting permanent systems and structures that can stand the test of time. This is where Modi scores way higher than his American counterpart Trump.

This is also where the Modi Government’s original idea of ‘Minimum Government, Maximum Governance’ validates itself more than eleven years later. Be it the idea of neem-coated urea, or the national monetisation pipeline, or the disinvestment of Air India, several ideas have been tried and tested in the Indian setup in the last ten years. Efficiency expedited, one administrative move at a time.

(Tushar Gupta is a senior journalist and political analyst)