* indians Vote in huge Elections * iran & israel have averted an allOut War – For Now
Indian General Elections Dominated by Jobs, Hindu Pride & Modi Himself
The first of India’s almost one billion voters cast ballots last Friday in the country’s multiday election, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeks a rare third term on the back of issues such as economic growth, social welfare and Hindu nationalism.
The vote pits Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) against an alliance of two dozen opposition parties that promise greater affirmative action and more handouts while stressing what they call the need to save democratic institutions (Reuters, April 20).
Nearly 970 million people are eligible to vote in the seven-phase electoral exercise, the world’s largest election, which runs through the peak of summer in highest temperatures until June 1, with results set for June 4 (just before the start of the monsoons). Election Commission figures after polls closed on Friday’s first day of voting estimated voter turnout at 60 % percent, with the northeastern state of Tripura top of the list at 80 % percent and the northwestern state of Rajasthan at the bottom with 51 % percent.
“Polling for the first phase… record high voter turnout despite heat wave,” the commission said. “The voting percentage is likely to go upwards when reports from all polling stations are obtained.” Friday’s vote covered 166 million voters in 102 constituencies across 21 states and union territories, from Tamil Nadu in the south to Arunachal Pradesh [ designated “South Tibet” by the Chinese ] on the Himalayan frontier with China in the north-east.
Opinion polls have suggested the BJP will easily win a majority, even though voters worry about unemployment, inflation and rural distress in the world’s most populous country and fastest growing major world economy. “Modi will come back to power, because apart from the religious push, is other work, in areas such as safety and security, is good,” said Abdul Sattar, 32, a Nuslim voter in the city of Kairana in January on Jobs were the chief concern for Mohammed Shabbir, another Muslim voter in Kairana. None of his eight children had regular employment, the 60-yearold driver said.
“Even the Hindus are affected by a lack of jobs,” he said, adding that the problem outweighed the appeal of Hindu nationalism in the Hindu-majority nation (Reuters). Hindu nationalism is a key election issue, especially after Modi’s consecration of a grand temple to Lord Ram in January on a site in Uttar Pradesh believed to be his birthplace, more than three decades after a Hindu mob destroyed a 16th century mosque that had stood there, leading to nationwide religious riots.
In 2019, the Supreme Court handed over the land to Hindus and ordered allotment of a separate plot to Muslims to build a new mosque.
Critics accuse Modi’s government and party of treating India’s 200 million minority Muslims unfairly to please their hardline Hindu base – an accusation that both deny. Modi hopes to win 370 of parliament’s 543 seats, up from 303 in 2019, hoping for a two-thirds majority that some analysts and opposition members fear could let his party usher in far-reaching constitutional changes.
Strong Southern Push
But in Tamil Nadu, one of India’s most developed states where the BJP is weak, voters seemed divided on whether Modi’s strong push this time around would benefit his party.
“Modi has made India a peaceful country, particularly for Hindus,” said S. Rajagopal, a three-wheel taxi driver in the state capital of Chennai.
“The BJP may not boost its vote share in Tamil Nadu but nationwide, Modi will win hands down again.”
However, V. Parasuraman, 55, a businessman in construction, said the BJP had done little for Tamil Nadu, adding, “People here won’t fall for Modi’s sugar-coated words” (Reuters).
The BJP campaign focuses largely on Modi’s guarantee to deliver on promises to voters.
Modi Speak
Modi was over-confident: “The country has made up its mind,” he said bragging and although there are still further rounds to go. “After today’s first round of voting, there is one thing visible… the country wants a strong, stable government”, and voting for the opposition alliance “is as good as wasting your vote,” he boasted. Campaigning continues during the election process for seats that are scheduled to vote in later phases. Victory for Modi would make him only the second Indian prime minister to be elected three times in a row, after post-independence leader Jawaharlal Nehru.
Weak, Fragmented Opposition Surveys show a big gap between the BJP and the opposition but political analyst Sandeep Shastri of the research firm Lokniti Network said it was not “necessarily unsurmountable”.
But some BJP insiders and analysts say the party is worried about complacency or overconfidence among voters and party members, and needs to draw more people to vote.
Yet the opposition’s “I.N.D.I.A.” alliance has struggled to forge unity. It has accused the government of hobbling its efforts by arresting its leaders in graft cases and making huge tax demands ahead of the vote--a charge the government denies. Rahul Gandhi, leader of the main opposition Congress party, said on X the election would decide the future of Indian democracy.
A win for Modi and the BJP may not, in fact, be a win for Indian democracy--or for the country’s great power ambitions, writes the eminent Indian historian Ramachandra Guha in Foreign Affairs: “India’s Feet of Clay. How Modi’s Supremacy Will Hinder His Country’s Rise.”
Throughout his decade in office, Modi has worked diligently to subordinate institutions, centralize and personalize political power, and compel religious and cultural uniformity. The Modi government, Guha warns compellingly, “is jeopardizing a key source of Indian strength: its varied forms of pluralism”--the fatal flaw in Modi’s policy that would otherwise be powerful and admirable!
“Strengthen democracy by applying the balm of your vote to the wounds inflicted on the soul of the nation in the last 10 years-defeat hatred,” Gandhi said on Friday [as a premonition?].
Israel vs. Iran: Is It Over?
The scope of Israel’s military response to Iran’s first-ever direct attack on the country remains mysterious.
Israeli military and civilian officials have yet to publicly acknowledge responsibility for reported overnight explosions around the central city of Isfahan last Friday.
Tehran has dismissed these attacks by “tiny drones” that were shot down by its air defence systems (CNN/Tamara Qiblawi, April 19).
Iran may be downplaying what was likely to have been a significant but limited Israeli attack, but that seems to be secondary to the larger forces at play.
What is plain to see is that both Iran and Israel are keen to wrap up the most dangerous escalation between the two regional powerhouses to date.
This month’s dramatic escalation, which kicked off with an apparent Israeli airstrike on Iran’s diplomatic compound in the Syrian capital Damascus, followed by a largely foiled attack of over 300 airborne weapons on Israel, seems to have given way to a rapid de-escalation.
Shortly after the Friday morning attack in Iran, a regional intelligence source told CNN’s Nic Robertson that Iran was not expected to respond further, and that the direct state-to-state strikes between the two antagonistic states were over.
The latest flare-up brought the stakes into sharp focus, but it also exposed the limits of a direct confrontation between Iran and Israel.
By attacking Iran’s consulate building in Syria on April 1 and killing a senior Iranian commander that serves as a key intermediary between Tehran an Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Israel risked provoking a response from the powerful Shia militant group on its northern border. As part of Iran’s retaliatory attack on Israel, its weapons navigated over at least two neighbouring countries that house US bases.
What happens between Iran and Israel rarely stays between Iran and Israel. The region is deeply intertwined. That heightens the risks of military action, but it also acts as guardrails against a potential conflagration.
Thus, when US officials said last weekend that Washington would not participate in an Israeli response to Iran’s attack on Israel, That seemed to immediately take the wind out of the sails of a potential escalation (CNN).
U.S. forces had shot down more than 70 of Iran’s aerial weapons as they headed to Israel. By buttressing Israel’s own defences, the US had ostensibly done its part in protecting its stalwart ally.
But participating in Friday’s attack would have been a step too far for the US, thrusting a region dotted with US-allied states into the unknown.
Tehran’s regional considerations may also be cause for restraint. Its fledgling thaw with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) – both major US allies – are a centerpiece of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s foreign policy. Diplomatic relations between Riyadh and Tehran – former archnemeses--were restored during talks brokered last year by China [which is absent in the current dynamics of the region], which threw its weight into maintaining those normalization agreements. Region-wide turmoil would risk compromising those key relationships.
Those dangers may be lost in Iran and Israel’s more hawkish quarters, where the more extremist elements may be itching for a final showdown.
Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir blasted Friday’s attack as “weak”.
Over the past week, Israeli media reported that he had urged Israel’s war cabinet to “go crazy” apparently bristling at indications of a tempered military response from Israel.
In Iran, analysts speculated that the shooting down of Iranian weapons in and around Israel’s airspace was likely to have underscored an imbalance of power in favour of its adversary, ultimately empowering the hardliners in Tehran to flout international pressure and advance the country’s long-feared nuclear programme.
This month’s eruption and titfor-tat will undoubtedly stir up domestic tensions as the two sworn enemies return to their long-running shadow war.
Iran’s non-state allies will continue to fight Israel and the US in various parts of the Middle East – they have vowed to keep up the fight as long as Israel’s devastating war in Gaza continues.
Those conflicts, which span Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen, grow in complexity the longer they continue.
Meanwhile, parties to these conflicts will continue to test the limits of the unwritten rules of engagement, hoping to assert their power and brandish their arsenal while preventing a complete spiral into war.
There is much to read between the lines of the latest flare-up. But it is clear that both sides of the regional confrontation have decided that they have too much to lose in an all-out war (CNN). Expert Analysis
According to former US diplomats writing in their “International Intrigue Newsletter”, the Israeli attack was probably a little more than what Israel’s allies wanted, but less than what they feared. And Iran’s initial responses – from dismissal to denial – all look like classic downplaying, carving out space for possible de-escalation (April 19).
Richard Haass , president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, writes in his newsletter “Home & Away”: “The Israeli action was also calibrated to make it easy for Iran not to respond. Israel’s government is not trumpeting what took place,” and the details “suggest the high likelihood that a serious conflict between Israel and Iran is not imminent…What just happened or more accurately didn’t happen in the Middle East is a rare piece of good news” (April 19).