'I'm Always in the Moment': ’God-Gifted’ PM Modi Reveals What Makes Him a Charismatic Leader

New Delhi: Stressing that listening is an important quality for leadership, Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently told Newsweek in an exclusive interview that he has cultivated the quality of listening, which he says is “god-gifted” to him. Responding to a question on how he continues to remain a charismatic leader, PM Modi emphasized on the significance of 'being in the moment'. “Another quality that I have is that I am always in the moment”, PM Modi said during the exclusive conversation with the magazine.

“I am not distracted by phone calls, messages or anything else”, the prime minister further said, adding, “When I am doing something, I am 100 percent involved and engrossed in that task”.

PM Modi – the only Indian prime minister after Indira Gandhi to be featured on the Newsweek cover– was addressing the magazine's written questions on subjects ranging from the economic development to infrastructural growth to environmental concerns to the country's ties with China.

According to the Newsweek report, PM Modi's written interview was followed up with a 90-minute conversation at the prime minister's official residence with the magazine's CEO Dev Pragad, Global Editor in Chief Nancy Cooper and Editorial Director, Asia, Danish Manzoor Bhat. 

Underlining the importance of having a bottom-to-top feedback channel, PM Modi said, "A leader should have the ability to connect to the grassroots and get unfiltered feedback".

"There should also be multiple such channels of feedback, so that human biases and preferences get neutralized", he added.

Revealing that he has spent at least one night in around 80 percent of the country's districts, the prime minister told Newsweek that his direct connections everywhere help him get direct feedback. 

Sharing an anecdote from the time when he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat, PM Modi revealed how one night he had received a call around 3am from someone in the town of Karjan (essentially because his staff was aware of his working style) to report an explosion, and how his timely intervention upon getting a direct head-start had helped his administration to respond to the incident, which was eventually found to be a train accident.

"Normally, no one alerts a CM so early in the morning, but my staff knew my working style, so they alerted me. The person had called to report a loud explosion in our town. He said I had gone to his home for a meal in my earlier days, so there was a sense of familiarity, owing to which he had the urge to call me directly", the prime minister stressed.

"...He told me that the railway line passes close to his house and it could be something related to the railways", PM Modi further said while revealing that he had called the district administration, railway officials and his staff to inquire  about the incident but nobody had – at the time – heard anything about it. 

"The entire administration was immediately set out to work, and it turned out to be a train accident. However, because we had a head start in terms of getting timely information, we were able to react promptly. Before sunrise, we had managed the entire situation: the injured were in the hospital, and the accident site was cleared", the prime minister added.

Asserting that ‘negativity has a low shelf life’, PM Modi concluded by underlining how one needs “to constantly churn out negativity for it to remain in people's minds”.

"Positivity, on the other hand, is perennial", he said, while stressing that his flagship radio program - ‘Mann Ki Baat’ is a medium for him “to gain positivity from society and amplify it”.