Modi gains ground in vote
INDIAN Prime Minister Narendra Modi scored a dramatic election victory yesterday, putting his Hindu nationalist party on course to increase its majority on a mandate of business-friendly policies and a tough stand on national security.
His re-election reinforces a global trend of right-wing populists sweeping to victory, from the US to Brazil, often after adopting harsh positions on protectionism, immigration and defence.
Official data from the Election Commission showed Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party ahead in 300 of the 542 seats up for grabs, up from the 282 it won in 2014, and more than the 272 seats needed for a majority in the lower house of parliament.
That would give his party the first back-to-back majority for a single party since 1984.
“Together we will build a strong and inclusive India,” Modi said on Twitter. “India wins yet again!”
Modi has slashed red tape in the world’s fifth-largest economy, though some overseas firms, including Amazon and Mastercard, have complained about policies they said were designed to benefit domestic rivals.
Modi now faces demands to provide jobs for the tens of millions of young people coming on to the market in the next few years and to boost depressed farm incomes.
“The immediate challenges are to address employment, the issue of agricultural income and revive the banking sector,” said Madan Sabnavis, chief economist at Care Ratings in Mumbai.
But making good on his promise of unity will be difficult as the BJP campaign was often divisive, and India’s Muslim minority has expressed fears that policies aimed at pleasing the Hindu majority could imperil their livelihoods.
Modi’s pledge of a strong stand against a separatist movement in Muslim-majority Kashmir has fuelled tension with nuclear-armed rival Pakistan, although its prime minister, Imran Khan, congratulated Modi on his win.
“Look forward to working with him for peace, progress and prosperity in South Asia,” Khan said on Twitter.
Cheering supporters set off firecrackers and showered the mastermind of the campaign, BJP president Amit Shah, with petals as he arrived at the party headquarters in New Delhi.
“It’s a stamp of approval by voters on the honest and decisive leadership of Prime Minister Modi,” said Nalin Kohli, a BJP spokesperson.
Most polls indicated a victory for Modi’s alliance but expected it to fall short of an overall majority.
Modi was under pressure when he began campaigning, losing three state elections in December amid rising anger over farm prices and unemployment.
However, campaigning shifted towards India’s relationship with Pakistan after a suicide bomber killed 40 Indian police in February in the NEW DELHI: India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose Hindu nationalist party has declared victory in parliamentary elections, has carefully cultivated his image as a pious man of the people.
Like President Donald Trump, to whom he is often compared, Modi is a big fan of Twitter and uses YouTube to bypass traditional media. His characterisation of opponents as out-of-touch elites resonates in a Himalayan region of Kashmir claimed by both countries.
Modi ordered an air strike on what India said was a militant training camp on the Pakistani side of the border, a tough response that benefited the right-wing BJP, analysts said.
The BJP has also capitalised on the star power of Modi, a frenetic campaigner, as well as its superior financial resources. It outspent Congress by six times on Facebook and Google advertising, data showed, and by as much as 20 times overall, sources said.
The main opposition Congress party was ahead in just 52 seats, but its leader Rahul Gandhi, twice defeated in general elections by Modi, refused to rule out resigning as party chief in a brief televised news conference.
Gandhi, whose father, grandmother and great-grandfather all served as prime minister, lost to the BJP candidate in the northern constituency of Amethi the family has held almost continuously for the past four decades.
But he was leading in the southern country where opportunity is often still constrained by caste.
He served as the chief minister of Gujarat state in 2002 when antiMuslim violence by Hindu mobs left about 1 000 people dead. Since he first took the helm of the Indian government in 2014, Hindu mobs have lynched dozens of people suspected of illegally transporting or consuming beef, further fuelling sectarian tensions. constituency from which he is also running for parliament. In the populous northern state of Uttar Pradesh, which sends the largest number of lawmakers to parliament, the BJP was leading in 60 of the 80 seats in the fray, out in front of a powerful alliance of caste-based parties campaigning to improve rural conditions.
“After the air strike on Pakistan, almost all these important issues started fading and farmers decided to cast their ballot for the BJP,” said Raghubar Das, 55, who grows rice and wheat on the outskirts of Ayodhya. “Mind you, they didn’t vote for the BJP, they voted for Modi. Everyone loves a strong a leader.”
The party also won seats in several states where it has long struggled, including West Bengal, where it took on the Trinamool Congress, a powerful regional party. Data showed it leading in 19 of 42 seats, surpassing the two it won in 2014.
Investors welcomed Modi’s victory, hoping his government will push through reforms. AYODHYA: THE thumping election win for India’s Hindu nationalist party yesterday has instilled a sense of resignation among Muslims, some of whom are now willing to concede the demand for a Hindu temple at the site of a razed mosque.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is expected to double down on demands of the majority Hindu community. INDIA’S seven-phase general election, the world’s largest democratic exercise, has come to an end after 39 days.
Voting began on April 11 and took place at about a million polling stations, ending on Sunday.
Visit https://tmsnrt.rs/2ErGqYt for an interactive Reuters graphic that takes a closer look at the voting apparatus, the density of polling stations and the arduous terrain government officials had to cover.
Guidelines from the Election Commission of India (ECI) state that no voter should be more than 2km from a polling station.
To facilitate this, nearly 11 million government officials and members of the security forces were deployed to ensure that more than 900 million eligible voters could cast their ballots.
Carrying electronic voting machines and systems to verify the ballots cast, officials ventured through forests, up and down steep, rocky cliffs and across sandbars, often travelling for days at a time.
The village of Tashigang, in the Spiti Valley in Himachal Pradesh, was the highest polling station in the world, according to the ECI. Fortynine voters were registered at the station – at an altitude of 4 650m.
Deep in the Gir wildlife sanctuary of Gujarat state, home to some 600 of the last Asiatic lions, a special polling station was set up for one priest at a Shiva temple.
Election official Sourabh Pardhi said the Election Commission worked hard to ensure everyone got the chance to vote. “We want to make sure that no voter is left behind,” he told the ANI news agency. | Reuters
Many Hindus believe a mosque razed in 1992 in the northern town of Ayodhya was built in the same place where Lord Ram, a physical incarnation of the Hindu god Vishnu, was born.
They also point to evidence there was a temple there before the mosque was built in 1528.
The destruction of the mosque by a Hindu mob led to riots that killed about 2 000 people.