The world is looking to the Trump-Xi dialogue for signs of temporary relief from the West Asian war and the cascading crisis it has unleashed. Yet, even if the talks produce meaningful progress, any tangible easing of the turmoil is likely to remain months away. Given this, prime minister Narendra Modi’s appeals asking Indians to practice economic prudence by reducing expenditure on fuel, gold, foreign travel, edible oils and fertilisers, and work from home was perhaps inevitable. As is its usual wont, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is spinning PM Modi’s appeals as a masterstroke and characterising them as a patriotic duty. But beneath the rhetoric lies a more uncomfortable question namely whether this is shared sacrifice or redistributed burden?Prudence or Pressure?At first glance, the government appears to be doing the best it can under the circumstances. After all, global energy markets remain volatile, food prices are sensitive, and geopolitical instability has tightened supply chains. Plus, neither the West Asian war nor the blockade of the Hormuz Strait were foreseeable. Moreover, much of the world is grappling with shortages of fuel, food, consumer goods, and other essential supplies (and as the BJP’s ecosystem argues, India is doing much better than other nations).However, each of these seven appeals ask Indians to internalise macroeconomic stress through behavioural restraint. In that sense, they are nothing short of moral coercion to police citizens into consuming less, travelling less, and investing differently (essentially lowering their aspirations). Instead of redressing the structural weaknesses wrought by the BJP government’s economic and foreign policy mismanagement, the prime minister is shifting the burden of macroeconomic stability onto Indians. Given this, it is critical to dissect the backstory behind and potential trajectories of these appeals.Firstly, the Modi government assured the nation that 70% of India’s crude imports now come from routes outside the Strait of Hormuz (compared to about 55% earlier). Yet, that assurance rings increasingly hollow. The Modi government has steadily eroded India’s energy sovereignty and security by narrowing the right to purchase discounted oil from Iran (in May 2019) and Venezuela (in 2020) in Indian rupees. Given its long-standing strategic ties with both Iran, India was well positioned to secure a steady flow of energy supplies despite the war in West Asia.After all, the first duty of any government is to safeguard the economic interests and security of its own citizens. Yet, by politically endorsing prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war against Iran (a conflict that is deeply entwined with the electoral compulsions of his Likud party ahead of Israel’s national elections), PM Modi has effectively alienated Tehran and undermined India’s long-term strategic interests, which previously enabled discounted oil access and smoother energy transit arrangements.Similar concerns extend to Russian oil imports, which at one stage accounted for 40% of India’s crude imports and was paid for partly in rupees. The Modi government significantly reduced import of discounted Russian oil after the United States of America (USA) imposed tariffs. Consequently, imports fell to a 44-month low in January 2026, representing a nearly 35% year-over-year reduction in volume.After the conflict in West Asia, Washington granted India an Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctions waiver to stabilise global energy markets and prevent fuel shortages (caused by supply chain disruptions and blockages at the Strait of Hormuz). However, with that waiver reportedly nearing expiry and Washington signalling that it will not be renewed, India once again finds itself staring at acute energy uncertainty. The Modi government appears so wary of provoking the United States that it reportedly redirected the tanker Kunpeng which is carrying 60,000 tonnes of LNG from Russia’s Baltic Portovaya plant to India, even before the OFAC waiver expires on May 16.Given that it is the Modi government which has consistently chosen to surrender India’s strategic autonomy, a legitimate question that we should be asking is why the burden of fiscal prudence is now being shifted onto citizens. After all, when global crude oil prices had crashed, the Modi government repeatedly raised excise duties on petrol (nine times in 15 months), and pocketed the windfall instead of passing it on to Indians. Between 2014 and 2021, excise duty on petrol rose from Rs 9.48 per litre to Rs 32.98 per litre (registering a 248% increase) and yielded Rs 38.89 lakh crore revenue to the Government of India.How Modi government neglected the expansion of India’s strategic oil reservesA government genuinely guided by the national interest would have channelled these resources into expanding strategic petroleum reserves, strengthening energy security, and building buffers against future crises. Instead, the BJP government squandered them on avoidable expenditure. Consider this – over the past 11 years, nearly Rs 5,987 crore was spent on prime minister Modi’s publicity alone (amounting to an average outlay of roughly Rs 1.5 crore every single day)!Secondly, the Modi government has inexplicably neglected the expansion of India’s strategic oil reserves over the past 12 years. The government led by Dr Manmohan Singh created India’s strategic petroleum reserve capacity of 5.33 million metric tonnes (or 39 million barrels). Today, that figure remains unchanged, with no meaningful expansion in dedicated strategic reserves. It has been estimated that it have cost Rs 30,000 crores to build storage capacity and fill them up (a fraction of the Rs 38.89 lakh crores which the government earned from fuel taxes and cesses).Even though the BJP government is desperately trying to assuage the nation by claiming we have 60 days of reserves, the truth is this is a deliberate accounting slight since crude sitting in refinery pipelines, ships in ports, and single-point moorings is also being included (which no nation counts as emergency reserves). Contrast this to China’s estimated 900 million-1.4 billion barrels of strategic crude oil reserves, which it is complementing with unfettered access to Iranian and Russian oil, as well as gas from Central Asia.The bitter truth is that despite the Modi government’s 2015 Urja Sangam promise to reduce India’s oil import dependency to 67% by 2022, crude oil dependence has instead risen from 77.6% in 2014 to 88.6% in 2026. This reflects the BJP government’s long-term underinvestment in counter-cyclical energy resilience.Likewise, even though the Modi government promised to double refining capacity to 450 million metric tonnes per annum (MMTPA) by 2030, today India has only 258 MMTPA refining capacity (with refining capacity before 2014 already at 215 MMPTA). Over 12 years, the Modi government has effectively added only about 43 MMTPA of refining capacity. This shortfall stems in part from the scrapping of the Nanar mega refinery project, delays in completing the HPCL Rajasthan Refinery, and the still-pending expansion of the Numaligarh Refinery. Meanwhile, projections of 450 MMTPA in refining capacity have been quietly scaled down to 309 MMTPA (which effectively means the Modi government is committing to adding only another 51 MMTPA refining capacity by 2030).As a result of both flawed foreign policy decisions and inertia, today India is untenably dependent on expensive, dollar-denominated oil imports, including Venezuelan crude, requiring significant foreign exchange outflows.Thirdly, discouraging gold purchases (which is deeply embedded in Indian culture) is bound to trigger public frustration. The official rationale is that private gold demands drain foreign exchange reserves, which stood at USD 690.6 billion in May 2026 (covering about 260 days of imports). While curbing imports could ease pressure on the balance of payments (given that India imported about USD 72 billion worth of gold in 2025) a year-long restriction would inflict sharp disruption on the gold retail and jewellery sector.Not only does this sector employs 10 million people in over three lakh entities (90% of which are Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises), it also accounts for about 15% of India’s total merchandise exports and generates about USD 90 billion annually (contributing about 7% to the nation’s GDP). Furthermore, even though the Marco-economic perspective views individual gold demand as a drain on foreign exchange, it is both socially and economically rational for individual households since it protects household purchasing power.Over and above the functional concerns, the prime minister’s appeals smacks of hypocrisy. In 2013, as the chief minister of Gujarat, Modi had lambasted a similar appeal by then finance minister P. Chidambaram to curb gold imports and caricatured it as an attempt to snatch away women’s mangalsutras.The government is obviously attempting to manage a severe trade deficit caused by soaring oil prices, and trying to discourage rupee conversion into dollars (which the government needs to bolster the currency, and purchase expensive crude oil). However, this burden should also not be passed on to Indians. After all, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) deployed between USD 45 billion and USD 57 billion on a net basis (the highest since the 2008 global financial crisis) to prevent a runaway depreciation of the Indian Rupee against the surging US dollar. This was partly because of unprecedented foreign portfolio outflows, which since 2025 have touched USD 39.8 billion (the worst since Indian markets were opened to overseas investment in 1993), while the net Foreign Direct Investment into India was merely USD 6.3 billion (in 2025-’26) and USD 959 billion (in 2024-’25).This is because instead of building a robust, competitive economy that attracts global investment, expands exports and strengthens manufacturing, the Modi government pursued divisive politics, lacklustre and performative policies, data-fudging and perpetual electioneering. The Modi government has not invested in creating a conducive environment for innovation, investment, or businesses. Instead, businesses are crippled by tax terrorism (with the government misusing agencies to extract rents from businesses).It is no coincidence that over 45,000 High-Net-Worth Individuals migrated out of India between 2014 and 2024 (registering a 72% increase from the previous decade) or that private sector’s total fixed investment as a share of real GDP shrunk from a peak of over 40% (in 2015) down to 33% (2024).However, there is more to this than meets the eye. Between September 2025 and March 2026, the RBI has added 86 metric tonnes of gold to its reserves (bringing the total to 880.5 tonnes, most of which is secure within domestic vaults in India). This is in sync with steps being taken by other nations, who are also enhancing sovereign stockpiles of gold to insulate themselves from geopolitical sanctions, and persistent inflation. There are increasing rumours that this also signals a step towards de-dollarisation (or at least dollar diversification). If this is genuinely the BJP government’s motivation, then why did it decline proposals to adopt a unified, bloc-wide BRICS currency union? This also doesn’t make sense, given the RBI has already experimented with Special Rupee Vostro Accounts (SRVA), which allows international trade with over 18 partner countries to be settled directly in the Indian Rupee.Dissecting this issue in detail lies beyond the scope of this article. However, it would suffice to say that private gold demand cannot be sacrificed at the altar of sovereign balance sheet management. Furthermore, the pressure on India’s foreign exchange reserves would likely have been far lower if India had continued buying crude oil directly from Iran and Russia in Indian rupees through bilateral settlement mechanisms. Today, there is pressure on foreign exchange reserves (and Indians) only because the Modi government aligned India’s energy and foreign policy too closely with US-led sanctions frameworks (thus foregoing discounted crude, free shipping, insurance, and extended credit terms).Fourthly, the agricultural sector offers another example of policy drift. India’s total Kharif fertiliser requirement stands at 390.54 lakh metric tonnes, while existing stocks cover only around 51% of demand. Farmers are therefore questioning the effectiveness of the government’s much-publicised Promotion of Alternate Nutrients for Agriculture Management (PM-PRANAM) scheme, which was launched in 2023 for a three-year period. Despite repeated announcements, no incentive has reportedly been disbursed to any state or union territory since the scheme’s launch.Against this backdrop, Modi’s call for farmers to reduce chemical fertiliser use by 50% appears disconnected from ground realities. If India sees a weak monsoon in 2026, it will severely impact agricultural productivity. This will not only worsen rural distress (with real wages in rural India seeing 0% growth for years, 35% of rural households facing indebtedness of roughly Rs 59,748, and 32,622 farmers and labourers committing suicide in the last three years) but also lead to high food inflation.Fifthly and more fundamentally, asking citizens to cut spending is economically self-defeating in an economy where nearly 56% of GDP is driven by Private Final Consumption Expenditure (which was already at a 21 year low in 2023-’24). If expenditure on fuel, travel (32.7 million travelled abroad in 2025), edible oils (65% imported worth USD 19.5 billion in 2026), transport and gold is sharply reduced, it risks weakening demand, slowing growth and worsening unemployment. According to the Periodic Labour Force Survey data, youth unemployment has already jumped to 15% in the January–March quarter in 2026 (the highest level in four quarters). At the same time, the per capita debt has mushroomed by over 23% over a two-year period, from Rs 3.9 lakh (in March 2023) to Rs 4.8 lakh (in March 2025). In an already fragile economy, suppressing consumption risks deepening distress rather than resolving the structural problems created by policies pursued over the last 12 years.Conclusion: Government of, by, and for the people – or of, by, and for Itself?In moments of global instability, national restraint is inevitable. However, restraint cannot become the primary architecture of governance. The truth is, the BJP government has done next to nothing to prepare the nation for this crisis. It seems the government was counting on an early end to Operation Epic Fury/Roaring Lion, and did not anticipate or plan for any other eventualities. Consequently, the BJP government has been burning away India’s scarce buffers and left India dangerously vulnerable. To deflect attention from these uncomfortable questions, the BJP’s propaganda machinery has circulated claims suggesting that prime minister Indira Gandhi once asked Indians to donate gold.Apart from being debunked by various newspapers, PM Indira Gandhi contributed her personal gold jewellery to the National Defence Fund during the war effort. Similarly, senior government functionaries have symbolically trimmed the size of their official convoys to signal solidarity with the sacrifices expected of citizens over the coming year. Apart from the fact that the government has (once again) cynically leveraged this opportunity to engineer a self-aggrandising publicity stunt, this in turn raises an obvious question. Why were convoys exceeding 100 vehicles ever deemed necessary, when a far leaner security arrangement could have sufficed in the first place?The larger issue is not whether citizens should behave responsibly during difficult times. Indians have repeatedly demonstrated resilience and sacrifice during crises. It is about prime minister Modi’s leadership. The real test of leadership is not how effectively or evocatively it asks citizens to tighten their belts, but how decisively it prevents them from ever having to. Unfortunately, what is being offered is a familiar inversion that the BJP successfully deployed during demonetisation and the Covid-19 pandemic. The citizens are being forced to bear the cost of the BJP’s governance failures.Which begs the question – Just how much more must India and Indians be expected to endure? And when will the Prime Minister truly step up? Quite frankly, a nation is not strengthened by sermons on restraint when its buffers have been eroded, its choices narrowed, and its strategic autonomy compromised. Ultimately, we all need to ask ourselves why after twelve years of a promised “Viksit Bharat” and “Amrit Kaal” under supposedly strong leadership, we the people, are repeatedly asked to sacrifice so much in the first place.Pushparaj Deshpande is Samruddha Bharat Foundation’s Director and Editor of The Great Indian Manthan (Penguin)