India’s ‘semi-final’ polls hint at potential for dramatic change

By Rajeev Sharma Source:Global Times Published: 2013-12-11 22:13:01

Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

Something extraordinary is happening in India. The Indian polity now has a new player: the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP, or Common Man's Party) which has provided a new and credible alternative to Indian voters, who are fatigued after disappointments from the two major parties.

Thus far, the Indian voter has had just two choices when electing the national government: the ruling Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the principal opposition party.

Now the AAP has arrived with a bang and has emerged as beacon of hope for 1.2 billion Indians as a third alternative.

India held assembly polls for five states - Delhi, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Mizoram. If one goes by the statistics, the BJP has wiped out the Congress in four states, whereas the Congress retained power only in Mizoram.

The future of the Congress party looks bleak at a time when general elections are just four months away.

Nevertheless, in Delhi, the BJP's march to power has been stalled by the freshly minted political party AAP, and the BJP will find it difficult to form its government in Delhi mainly because of a spectacular debut performance by the AAP.

So, does it mean that the BJP is ascendant and just a step away from regaining power at the center? Does it indicate the end of the road for the ruling Congress?

These questions will be on the minds of voters over the coming months.

The assembly election results have kicked up a political storm which will inevitably have huge long-term implications for India.

Congress has been a key force in India for about six decades, since Indian independence was wrested from the British in 1947, and has been ruling India consistently since 2004. Nonetheless, it is now faced with the possibility of an ignominious rout in the coming general elections.

Rahul Gandhi, the long-time prime minister-in-waiting and the Congress vice president, has proven to be a dud. This may necessitate a rethink on part of the Congress whether the party will continue to rally behind the 43-year-old Rahul or the party will search for a new figurehead.

Meanwhile, for the BJP, the rightist Hindutva party may cheer the assembly poll results, but its eventual goal of wresting the main seat of power in New Delhi may have been ruined by the strong showing of the AAP.

The AAP has only fought elections in Delhi and ended up winning 28 seats in the 70-member assembly.

It denied a clear victory to the BJP which managed to get 32 seats, five short of an absolute majority. The Congress mustered just eight seats, 35 fewer than last time.

The most damning conclusion of this "semi-final" for the BJP is that its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, the chief minister of Gujarat, has failed to prove to be a game-changer for his party.

He addressed six rallies in Delhi and yet the overall vote percentage of the party fell by 3 percent compared to the previous time.

Added to this is the fact that the BJP barely managed to survive a scare in Chhattisgarh where the Congress engaged the BJP in a neck-and-neck contest despite Modi campaigning in the state intensively.

This conclusively proves that there is no Modi wave, as the BJP sympathizers would like the nation to believe.

The assembly poll results in the five Indian states have muddied the Indian political waters. Only a fool would be betting on the fortunes of the BJP and the Congress.

India is known and appreciated the world over for its democracy; and India's "D" factor has just gotten more meaningful and respectable. Indian politics has just gained an X factor which has put it on a crossroads like never before.

The author is a New Delhi-based journalist-author and a political commentator. bhootnath004@yahoo.com



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