By Varghese K George
TheHindu.com
May 16, 2014
As trends from across the country emerge, it is clear that Narendra
Modi will be the next prime minister of India. With leads in 530 of the
543 seats available, the BJP and its allies were leading in nearly 313
seats, much more than the halfway mark.
What appears also clear by 11 am, within three hours after the
counting begun, is that the BJP is headed for a historic victory and the
Congress towards a catastrophic failure. The BJP appears sweeping
Gujarat, Delhi, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, while
Congress mascot Rahul Gandhi faces a tough battle in home constituency
Amethi. Mr Gandhi is trailing behind his BJP opponent Smriti Irani in
early counting rounds, while SP supremo Mulayam Singh just may lose in
Azamgarh.
Not only has the BJP consolidated in its strongholds such as Gujarat
and Rajasthan, it has emerged from the ashes in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh
and blazed a new trail in unlikely states such as West Bengal and Assam.
The BJP also was leading in one seat in Kerala – a state where the
party had marginal presence.
With the stamp of Mr Modi writ all over the outcome, the Gujarat
strongman has emerged as a pan-Indian leader, who has overcome barriers
of geography, caste, class and demography to stitch together an alliance
that catapulted the saffron party to an impressive victory. Early last
year, when he took over the reins of the BJP campaign, it was gasping
for survival, but what followed has perhaps changed the political
landscape of India.
The process of government formation will kick in with the election
commissioners meeting the president of India on 19th evening to present
him the results of the 16th general elections. The BJP parliamentary
party will elect him the leader soon after and the swearing in could be
expected on 23rd or 24th of May.
Equally startling as the BJP victory is the comprehensive defeat of
the Congress that has been at the head of the government for the last 10
years. There appeared hardly any state other than Kerala, where the
party was expected to hold on to a respectable presence. Party
heavyweights ranging from Kapil Sibal to Kamal Nath and new entrants
such as IT czar Nandan Nilekani appeared beaten at the hustings.
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12 comments:
My Comment from LankaWEb.com:
.........
Lorenzo said “There is a strong chance Endia may break up into small pieces during Modi’s rule.”
Arrant Nonsense!
Under Modi, Indian society will be DISCIPLINED, national infrastructure will be BUILT, its economy will BLOOM, and its foreign policy will be entirely in the National Interest.
Those naysayers who demonized Modi as a Hindu zealot out to destroy minorities will be proven WRONG. Modi will turn out to be a patriotic Indian Nationalist beholden to NO CASTE, NO RACE, NO RELIGION and NO FOREIGN POWER, and committed only to the greater good of ALL INDIANS.
My Comment from LankaWeb.com:
.......
BW,
You are mistaken; the AIADMK (led by Jayalalitha) succeeded beyond its wildest dreams in the recent Lok Sabha elections, shutting out all other Tamil parties, and becoming the 3rd largest party in the Lok Sabha, after the BJP and the Congress Party.
However, the landslide victory of the BJP has eliminated its previous compulsion for coalition partners to form a government, and execute its policies in the Indian parliament. In that sense, the AIADMK has "lost its leverage", and its ability to blackmail the BJP for strong action against Sri Lanka on Sri Lankan Tamil issues.
Nevertheless, the BJP is very likely to invite the AIADMK and other minority parties into a coalition, to consolidate its power further and deny those allies to the Congress Party in the opposition, but none of those parties will exercise much power. It is the BJP, and the BJP alone, that will determine Indian Govt policy in the foreseeable future.
If the GOSL plays its cards right, and establishes a good relationship with Modi, Sri Lanka can benefit greatly, primarily in countering Tamil Nadu forces, the Sri Lankan Tamil Diaspora and Western Neocolonialists seeking to undermine Sri Lanka. Modi may be amenable to such overtures from SRi Lanka, because as a Hindu Nationalist curbing separatist regional powers and strengthening the power of the central govt will be among his priorities. We recall that many state governments flouted and undermined national policies and priorities (eg. Tamil parties on Sri Lanka policy, Mamata Banerjee on illegal-immigration agreements with Bangladesh, several States on anti-terrorism policies against Naxalites, etc etc) wihich undermined the writ of the union govt and undermined India's international standing.
If the GOSL succeeds in doing that, Sri Lanka will gain some freedom of action for perhaps 5 years until the next Lok Sabha elections, when things could turn completely around.
Therein lies the danger: If the GOSL thinks any benefit that accrues from the BJP win is permanent, and DOES NOTHING to FREE Sri Lanka from the dangers posed by its global enemies, and by the DOMINATION of our country by India, it will be a great mistake.
The direction of India's internal politics will continue to shift wildly like a weather vane; Sri Lanka CANNOT & MUST NOT depend upon it, nor allow Sri Lanka's integrity and economic progress to be determined by India's local politics.
Sri Lanka must go full steam ahead at making itself completely FREE of Indian dominance, treating any restrictions placed by the BJP upon its Tamil enemies at this time as a TEMPORARY BLESSING, until the next wind of political change blows in India in a different direction.
Bharat ki Vijay … Every success to our Indian cousins!
Freed from the BLACKMAIL of the congenital RACISTS of Tamil Nadu, India and Modi can now adopt a policy of strict non-interference in internal affairs of Sri Lanka, and collaborate to the mutual benefit of our two nations!
The Landside victory of the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections has one POSITIVE benefit for Sri Lanka: The BJP does not need the support of other parties in a coalition to govern, and therefore Jayalalitha’s AIADMK (which is also doing well in Tamil Nadu) will be UNABLE TO BLACKMAIL the BJP into acting against Sri Lanka on Sri Lanka Tamil issues.
From TheHindu.com:
Our Correspondent K. Manikandan reports: ” We (the BJP) are very happy. We are now in a very comfortable situation that we do not need to depend on the AIADMK for support for govt. formation at the Centre,” said L. Ganesan (South Chennai BJP candidate). “
Give Modi a chance.
I do not believe him to be the DEMON his detractors make him out to be. Just like MR, he will not tolerate those who undermine the nation for their own profit and for communal prejudices, but he will be FAIR and JUST to all law-abiding, progressive and patriotic citizens.
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Special Report – In Modi’s India, a case of rule and divide
By John Chalmers and Frank Jack Daniel
(Reuters) – Ali Husain is a prosperous young Muslim businessman. He recently bought a Mercedes and lives in a suburban-style gated community that itself sits inside a ghetto.
In Gujarat, it is so difficult for Muslims to buy property in areas dominated by Hindus even the community’s fast-growing urban middle class is confined to cramped and decrepit corners of cities.
Husain embodies the paradox of Gujarat: the state’s pro-business leadership has created opportunities for entrepreneurs of all creeds; yet religious prejudice and segregation are deeply, and even legally, engrained.
If a Muslim enquires about a property in a new development, often the response is: “Why are you even asking?” said Husain, speaking at his home in the Muslim neighbourhood of Juhapura, where filthy slum streets rub against smart new apartment blocks and enclaves.
....Continued 1....
Separation of communities is common across India. Nowhere is it as systematised as it has become in Gujarat.
That matters because the state’s chief minister, Narendra Modi, could soon run the country. Exit polls show that when results of a general election are announced on May 16, Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies will win a majority in parliament, almost certainly making him the next prime minister.
The 63-year-old Hindu nationalist has ruled Gujarat since 2001. He has surrounded himself with technocrats – and also ministers and advisers who promote “Hindutva”, a belief in the supremacy of Hinduism. As prime minister, Modi would lead not just 975 million Hindus but 175 million Muslims, around 15 percent of India’s population and the third-largest Muslim population in the world.
Modi’s record in his state is clouded by riots in 2002, when 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, died in a frenzy of mob violence. Modi still struggles to shake off the perception he did not do enough to stop the bloodshed, despite a Supreme Court investigation that found no case against him and his own insistence he did all he could to keep the peace.
Even some Hindus connect Modi to the riots. Pradeep Shukla, a prominent Hindu businessman and former member of the BJP in the Gujarati town of Bhavnagar said Hindus “believe that, somewhere, indirectly, Modi had a hand in it because he supports Hindus. This is why they vote for him.”
On the campaign trail, Modi has tried to project a moderate image with a platform that downplays hot-button Hindu issues and emphasises growth and “development for all”.
But in Gujarat’s neighbourhoods and cities, people tell a different story.
HISTORY SCARRED BY VIOLENCE
Husain is one of roughly 400,000 people living in Juhapura, a teeming Muslim township within Ahmedabad, Gujarat’s largest city. Many of them moved there after the 2002 riots. Local Hindus jokingly refer to it as “Little Pakistan”.
India’s history is scarred by episodes of horrific Hindu-Muslim violence. At least 200,000 people were killed in the months after the country was divided into India and Pakistan at independence from Britain in 1947. The destruction of an ancient mosque in 1992 by Hindu zealots in Ayodhya triggered religious rioting across India. Modi visited Ayodhya on May 5, repeatedly invoking the name of Lord Ram.
Memories of the 2002 rioting have not faded for the many residents of Juhapura who lost relatives, homes and businesses. And its legacy has been increasing segregation.
In particular, a property law unique to Gujarat has perpetuated segregation, creating ghettos such as Juhapura and a sense of apartheid in some urban areas.
The “Disturbed Areas Act”, a law that restricts Muslims and Hindus from selling property to each other in “sensitive” areas, was introduced in 1991 to avert an exodus or distress sales in neighbourhoods hit by inter-religious unrest.
Modi’s government amended the law in 2009 to give local officials greater power to decide on property sales. It also extended the reach of the law, most recently in 2013 – 11 years after the last major religious riots.
The state government says the law is meant to protect Muslims, who account for just under 10 percent of the state’s 60 million people. “It prevents ethnic cleansing and people being forced out,” a senior government official who requested anonymity told Reuters.
Critics say the act’s continued enforcement and the addition of new districts covered by it – about 40 percent of Ahmedabad is now governed by the law – means it is effectively being applied as a tool of social engineering.
The Gujarat High Court in a 2012 case questioned the state government’s use of the act to block the sale of properties by Hindus to Muslims.
The Indian Express newspaper said in a recent editorial: “More Muslims and Hindus have moved into separate spaces in Gujarat, finding trust and assurance only among neighbours of their own community, and it has ended up entrenching segregation and shutting Muslims out of the mainstream.”
....Continued 2....
“SPIT ON HIM”
Among those pressing hardest for the law to be maintained and extended to other parts of Gujarat are Hindu nationalists, such as Pravin Togadia.
One evening in April, Togadia sat before a crowd of neighbours in a tranquil residential street of Bhavnagar, an otherwise bustling town three hours drive from Ahmedabad. To bursts of applause, he railed against a Muslim scrap dealer, Ali Asghar Zaveri, who had dared to purchase a property there.
His forehead smeared with vermillion, a mark of piety, Togadia told his audience they should break open their new neighbour’s padlocked gates and take over the two houses behind them before Zaveri could get a chance to move in.
“When he comes out onto the street, you should spit on him,” he told the gathering. “Get 10-15 children to stand around and … throw tomatoes at him.”
Togadia added that if Zaveri did not give up the property, which he reportedly bought for $250,000, they should go in their thousands to his scrap shop and surround it.
“Take stones with you, burn tyres,” he said, according to a video of the meeting, which concluded with women in the crowd of around 100 people chanting a Hindu hymn.
The video was posted on YouTube (click here to see). Local police, who acquired a copy, have filed a case of “hate speech” against Togadia.
Togadia is president of the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), a pugnacious group in a family of Hindu nationalist organisations that includes Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Togadia did not respond to questions from Reuters. According to local media reports, he said news articles about the incident were “fabricated and written with malicious intention to malign” both him and his organisation.
Modi did not comment directly on the VHP leader’s outburst. But in a tweet widely interpreted as condemnation, he said he disapproved of “petty statements by those claiming to be the BJP’s well-wishers”.
Modi was not available to comment for this story.
ESCALATING PROPERTY PRICES
Bhavnagar is not covered by the Disturbed Areas Act. But in one district of the town, Hindus have effectively imposed it, raising a banner at the entry to a narrow lane that reads: “In this area, locality or by-lane no property or building can be sold or rented to people who are not of this religion.”
Reuters interviewed two local VHP leaders who said they have made repeated requests since 2004 for Bhavnagar to be put under the Disturbed Areas Act.
One of the two, S.D. Jani, said Hindus object to Muslims living among them because they are not vegetarian and many have committed acts of terrorism abroad. His colleague, Kirit Mistry, complained that Muslims slaughter cows, which are sacred to Hindus, and that the Muslim population is growing faster than Hindus because they have more children.
Several Hindus who declined to be named for this story said if Muslims buy property in their areas, the value of their own homes falls. One said the stigma of living alongside Muslims can make it difficult for Hindus to marry off their daughters.
One consequence of the segregation: land and home prices in Juhapura and other Muslim areas have escalated more than in Hindu areas as the community finds its ability to expand and build more properties limited.
“Prices have increased so much because the expansion of Juhapura has been contained, not only by walls but also by the building of Hindu colonies …at the periphery of the locality,” Christophe Jaffrelot, a scholar with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote in a recent column in the Indian Express.
....Continued 3...
MUSLIMS FOR MODI
At the same time, some Muslims in Gujarat have been lifted on a tide of rising prosperity. The state has long been a model of economic success in India given its coastal location, large ports and industrialisation.
According to National Survey Sample Office figures, for instance, Gujarat is one of the top states for Muslim employment. The national unemployment rate among Muslims was almost double that of Gujarati Muslims in 2009-10.
But the picture is far from clear. Data from the same source showed nearly one in three Gujarati Hindus had a secondary education or higher in 2009-10, against one in five for Muslims – roughly in line with the average for Muslims across the country.
Zafar Sareshwala is among those who have prospered. One of Gujarat’s wealthiest Muslims, he owns a chain of BMW showrooms. Sareshwala supports Modi even though his family was financially ruined by the 2002 unrest. His view changed overnight the following year, he said, after a meeting with Modi.
“He was deeply anguished. He was apologetic about the scale of the damage,” Sareshwala recalled. “Modi promised justice would be delivered and said he would never discriminate against Muslims.”
Sareshwala estimated that 30 percent of Gujarat’s Muslims now back the BJP thanks to urban development and access to services that Modi has brought. Opinion polls have not projected the Muslim vote in Gujarat.
“People call him a dictator, I call him decisive,” he said.
Even much poorer Muslims back Modi. In a dirt-poor Ahmedabad riverside slum of about 150 families, most of them Muslim, five of eight women who spoke with Reuters said they had voted for the BJP, even though Modi’s government bulldozed their rickety homes two years ago, forcing them to rebuild away from the waterfront.
“Modi has done some good work. Our children can get scholarships and school meals. Women feel protected, and widows get compensation,” said 48-year-old Shabnam Banu, sitting on the floor with her friends in a simple room where a slow-moving ceiling fan did little to alleviate the pre-monsoon heat.
Still, Banu herself couldn’t bring herself to vote for Modi, selecting the “none of the above” option on election day.
“Our main fear is he will throw us out of the country,” she said. “What if some of his people come and attack us?”
....Continued 4....
PEOPLE ARE AFRAID
In Juhapura, businessman Ali Husain has made it his mission to break down barriers between the state’s communities. Two years ago he persuaded a major developer to sell homes to Muslims in luxury townships on the edge of Ahmedabad, and he is now working with a Hindu company to produce Halal food.
Other initiatives have flopped. In February, Husain organised a Hindu-Muslim business conclave, sponsored by the state government and addressed by Modi. Few Muslims turned up. “Truly speaking, the Muslims, they are not with Modi,” he said.
Husain has bought a house in a Hindu area of Ahmedabad, and wants to move out of Juhapura. But his parents are too scared to leave. He is too nervous to even take the sheet off his Mercedes because neighbours might think, after his recent meeting with Modi, he has sold out for money.
“I encourage Muslims to come out of Muslim areas and live everywhere, to end ghettoization,” Husain said. “But … people are afraid that if they come out the violence could happen again.”
(Additional reporting by Aditi Shah in BHAVNAGAR, VADODARA and AHMEDABAD, India and by Himanshu Ojha in LONDON; Editing by Simon Robinson and Bill Tarrant)
And RIGHT ON CUE, President Mahinda Rajapaksa reaches out to Mr. Narendra Modi to forge a mutually beneficial relationship between out two countries.
That new relationship should be based on STRICT NON-INTERFERENCE of India in the INTERNAL AFFAIRS of Sri Lanka, and on cooperation in national security and economic growth; anything less would be a continuation of the EVIL PAST.
While we HOPE for the BEST, we must also PREPARE for the WORST, and should FREE SrimLanka from its captivity to India's Internal Politics PERMANENTLY.
Jayawewa!
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Sri Lankan President congratulates India's next Prime Minister, invites him to visit country
ColomboPage News Desk, Sri Lanka.
May 16, Colombo: Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa today congratulated India's Prime Minister elect Narendra Modi on his landmark win and invited him for a state visit to Sri Lanka.
President Rajapaksa congratulated Mr. Modi and said that the economic progress could be achieved only through a stable government and he was glad that Mr. Modi would be able to form a stable government with his party's resounding victory.
Prime Ministerial candidate of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Narendra Modi is expected to be invited to form the next government after the official declaration of the general elections results. The BJP led alliance is likely to get over 330 seats in the 543-member Lok Sabha.
Votes counted so far suggest the BJP is on course for the most resounding victory by any party for 30 years, the BBC said.
President Rajapaksa extended Mr. Modi an invitation to pay a state visit to Sri Lanka at his earliest convenience.
Modi will take oath on May 21 as the next Prime Minister of India before President Pranab Mukerjee at the Rashtrapathi Bhavan in New Delhi.
How Modi resolves objections by Tamil Nadu party leaders to his inviting President Mahinda Rajapaksa to his inauguration will provide an early indication of his attitude towards Sri Lanka in the future, and his willingness to use his lanndslide victory to discipline India's internal administration.
Will he have the backbone to enforce foreign policy in the National Interest, or will Modi buckle in face of the IMPLIED THREAT by the Racist leaders of Tamil Nadu, to agitate for secession of the Dravidian South, and Tamil Nadu in particular, from the Indian Union?
Will Modi have the GUTS, as Jawarharlal Nehru did, to come down forcefully on upstart states that threaten TREASONOUS SECESSION with India's SEDITION Laws?
This issue of reigning-in UNRULY States that increasingly challenge the power of the Union Govt is an issue that will be central to the future teritorial integrity of India. If every regional power having an axe to grid with a neighboring country tries to blackmail the Union Govt and vetos National Policy, India will disintegrate fast, as neighboring countries and the Neocolonialist west intervenes to create power blocks within India.
We saw this in action already during the last UPA Govt when Hillary Clinton vited Tamil Nadu ignoring India's Federal Govt and plotted strategy against Sri Lanka, and perhaps, even helped to engineer Jayalalitha's landslide Lok Sabha election victory.
If Modi fails to assert his authority NOW, it may be viewed as a sign of weakness, and we may increasingly see regional powers attempting carve out their fiefdoms independent of the federal authority.
What Modi does now on this issue will signal his willingness to fight for the unity and integrity of India even as he moves to deliver on his election vows to develop India's infrastructure, streamline and improve the efficiency and honesty of its administration, and grow the economy to uplift its people.
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In First Anti-Lanka Hurdle, Vaiko Puts Modi in a Fix over Rajapaksa’s Presence
NewIndianExpress.com
May 22, 2014
CHENNAI: The euphoria of the election victory began to fade off in the face of practical problems for the BJP, as MDMK chief Vaiko urged NDA leaders against having Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa at the swearing in of prime minister-designate Narendra Modi and his Cabinet.
“News that the great sinner Rajapaksa has been invited to attend the historic swearing in of Narendra Modi has come as a lightning bolt,” said Vaiko in a statement late on Wednesday evening.
“I would like to point out that the Sri Lankan President was not invited to the swearing in of the NDA government under A B Vajpayee in 1998 and 1999, or the UPA governments in 2004 and 2009. I pray to prime minister-designate Narendra Modi, BJP president Rajnath Singh and other NDA leaders not to inflict an unbearable wound on the sentiments of Tamils living in Tamil Nadu and around the world,” said Vaiko.
The MDMK leader’s plea is the beginning of doubts from within the new government’s engagement with Sri Lanka. What could add further fuel to the embers would be the fact that BJP senior Sushma Swaraj’s name has been doing the rounds for the Ministry of External Affairs. Swaraj had drawn sharp criticism when she had been part of a delegation of MPs that had visited Sri Lanka to tour the rehabilitation camps for Lankan Tamils and to survey the work being undertaken.
Vaiko’s plea to the incoming government is likely to be replicated by a number of political parties in Tamil Nadu, who could even be expected to give the swearing in ceremony at Delhi a miss if Rajapaksa is going to be present.
Mark my Words .... Five years from now, Tamil Nadu leaders will be backing the Congress Party, hoping to undermine Modi's electoral strength at the Centre, and create a weaker Union Govt that they can blackmail ... as they did before!
That will UNDERSCORE my warning that Sri Lanka has to use the intervening 5 years to raise itself into an UNASSAILABLE POSITION to weather the return of POLITICS AS USUAL in India .. 5 years from now!
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Tamil Nadu CM not happy with Indian PM's invitation to Sri Lankan President
ColomboPage News Desk, Sri Lanka.
May 22,Chennai: Beginning to exert pressure on the new Indian government even before the incoming Prime Minister is sworn-in, the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa has expressed her dismay on the new PM's invitation to Sri Lankan President to attend his inauguration.
In a statement Tamil Nadu Chief Minister said today that the new Government taking charge in a few days in New Delhi no way alters the already existing strained relations between Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka.
The new Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi has invited all the heads of SAARC countries - Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka - for his swearing-in ceremony at the Rashtrapati Bhavan on May 26.
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa, keen to better the strained relations with the neighbor, has accepted the invitation to attend the ceremony.
Recalling that the Tamil Nadu government over the last three years had passed numerous resolutions against Sri Lanka including an economic embargo, the Chief Minister said the previous government chose to ignore the resolutions and "trampled the sentiments" of the Tamils.
With the election of the new government, she said, her state had hoped that the new Government to be formed at the Centre would be sympathetic to the cause of Tamils and friendly to the State of Tamil Nadu.
"However, even before the new Prime Minister and the new Government assume office and begin functioning, this unfortunate move of inviting the Sri Lankan President to attend the Swearing-in Ceremony of the new Prime Minister of India has deeply upset the people of Tamil Nadu and wounded their sentiments all over again," Ms. Jayalalithaa said.
She said the invitation to Sri Lankan President is "tantamount to rubbing salt into the wounds of the already deeply injured Tamil psyche."
The Chief Minister suggested the new Central Government that it would be better for the relationship with the state government if this "ill-advised move" had been avoided.
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