quite so decisively or quite as fast. His med organisational skills were certainly display: His cabinet decided, the prime minister addressed the nation and the gov ernor of the Reserve Bank of India whose signature is on the notes, after all fol owed him on TV with a message of calm. And all this, without even a hint of the plan leaking out in advance In some ways, Mr Modi's hand was forced. One of his most potent promises when on the campaign trail in 2014 was to "bring back black money" from for eign tax havens. In spite of any number of press releases and a much-hyped amnesty scheme, he couldn't live up to that promise. The amnesty in particular was a conspicu ous failure, bringing in a tiny fraction of the money that Indonesia and Argentina have repatriated using similar amnesty windows. With this announcement, Mr Modi's turned a political liability into a political success; there isn't a voter in India who won't know that their government's taken a big step against tax evasion. Within seconds of the speech, got a message on WhatsApp from my personal banker, calling the move a "surgical strike" against black money; the phrase drew a parallel with a widely popu lar attack by Indian soldiers last month on terrorist staging camps across the Line of