Tuesday, February 11, 2020

Moditva or the Lack of it: When it comes to assembly polls, Indian states prefer to keep Lotus party out

LJP president Chirag Paswan says people reward parties on the basis of work.

"Just as in the Lok Sabha elections, Narendra Modi ji got vote, today Arvind Kejriwal ji got the blessings of the people on the basis of his work. Lots of best wishes," Chirag, son of Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan, tweeted.


The big picture message is hardly understood by many. Is Indian voter opting for a strong centre under Narendra Modi and reposing faith on regional players when it comes to state polls? They do not mind even the Congress --- taking over reins of power in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh where the BJP has been in power for 15 long years since 2003 up to 2018.


In fact, when it comes to state polls - the BJP is experiencing defeats in state after state! In December 2018 assembly polls, Congress ousted BJP in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and also Rajasthan.
In 2019 high voltage polls, the BJP got an enhanced mandate. But the BJP did not do well in Haryana although it captured power by working out a post-poll alliance politics with a regional player.

BJP and its erstwhile party Shiv Sena won in Maharashtra but Sena ditched to capture power by aligning with the Congress and the NCP. In Jharkhand again, the BJP has lost a key state with tribal population.
Earlier in May 2018, the Lotus party could win in Karnataka and initially got a setback as JD(S) and Congress formed government. However, the BJP is back in power in Bengaluru after it won over disgruntled opposition MLAs.

In next few months, the focus will be on Bihar polls. The BJP had lost power in Bihar in November 2015. In 2016, BJP won Assam and was hardly a fighter in West Bengal and Kerala.

But in 2017, there was a big win in Uttar Pradesh and the saffron party put Hindu monk Yogi Adityanath in the corridors of power.



The BJP has lost Delhi yet again. Here too, the voters have shown faith in the regional player - AAP.



Former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda wrote a letter congratuling Arvind Kejriwal over AAP's "splendid" win.

"You richly deserved this win. It is also a remarkably good sign in Indian politics that your focus on development has paid off immensely," Gowda said.

"Your victory assures the rest of India yet again that desperate acts of communal polarisation has limited currency. The talk of your government's good work in the health and education sectors has reached the corners of Karnataka and the rest of India too," said Deve Gowda.

P Chidambaram, Congress


"AAP won, bluff and bluster lost. The people of Delhi, who are from all parts of India, have defeated the polarising, divisive and dangerous agenda of the BJP," Chidambaram tweeted.
"I salute the people of Delhi who have set an example to other states that will hold their elections in 2021 and 2022," he said.


"Remember, when Delhi voted, millions of Malayalees, Tamils, Telugus, Bengalis, Gujaratis and people who came from other states of India voted. If the voters represent the views of the states they came from, the Delhi vote is a booster for the confidence of the Opposition that the BJP can be defeated in every state," Chidambaram said.


What is right and wrong about BJP campaign and why things did not convince the voters?

In 2015, PM Modi had campaigned aggressively addressing several rallies, but the result had gone in favour of AAP.

This time around it was Amit Shah - who took charge ! Number of Chief Ministers, Union ministers and over 250 MPs -- including all seven from Delhi - campaigned. Amit Shah led high pitched rallies and roadshows, but all of these did not change the heart of Delhi voters !


Take a closer look and it was perhaps a shocker as just nine months back, PM Modi was BJP's mascot and only vote getter and the party had won near 57 per cent votes in Delhi in 2019 parliamentary polls. BJP had won all seven seats in 2019 and they had done so in 2014 also!

A new Narrative

Some RSS leaders are happy one way !!

And it is not without good reason, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is now cheering up 'Bharat Mata Ki Jai' and 'Jai Hanuman'.

It is the neo-Hinduisation of India polity !! For a change, everyone is turning pro-Hindu !! Observers say there will be more of temple run by the likes of Rahul Gandhi and other leaders.


In August last year, AAP leader Kejriwal was among the first to back abrogation of the Article 370.

Like Modi had mixed his development syntax with Hindutva tilt, the AAP is not totally against a tilt towards Hindutva agenda. He avoided visiting Shaheen Bagh and has been constantly said that his government is committed to welfarism !!

Therefore, the BJP and Amit Shah's consistent attempts to label Kejriwal as working against India could not go further. Kejriwal also played it up well --- "People of Delhi will decide whether I am a terrorist or your son".

Congress could garner only 4.31 - the record lowest 


AAP polled 53.65 per cent of the votes in February 8 elections in Delhi, the Congress could garner only 4.31 - the record lowest and the BJP managed only 38.47 per cent.


The Congress vote percentage came below five per cent bar ! And the grand old party failed to open its account yet again. It had scored zero earlier in 2015 assembly polls and also in 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

In the 2015 Assembly elections, the Congress vote share was 9.7 per cent - thus it implies poor show by the Congress actually helped AAP cause better and BJP failed to touch double figures - confined to just 8 seats -- a five leap from the tally of three in 2015.


Notably for the Congress, it has unable to even save the security deposits of its candidates in many seats. The Congress alliance with RJD - which was given four seats too did not make any difference.

After former Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit took charge of party affairs ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, significantly the grand old party made ground. The party''s vote share increased to 22 per cent though no Congress candidate won. But the AAP's voteshare was 18 per cent - a clear third.

Congress leader Sharmistha Mukherjee said: "The BJP has divisive politics, Arvind Kejriwal has smart politics, but what are we doing? Can we honestly say that we have done all to put our house in order? We are busy capturing the Congress whereas other parties are capturing India. If we are to survive, it's time to come out of our exalted echo chambers!"

The Congress has been a divided house in Delhi since 2010 when the Commonwealth Games were organised.
The corruption charge actually stuck ! The Nirbhaya case in 2012 was also mishanded !






"There are seven important macroeconomic indicators which show that there are green shoots in the economy... economy is not in trouble," Nirmala Sitharaman said in Lok Sabha replying to the debate on the Budget 2020-21. 

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman was in her combative style. She slammed former finance minister P Chidambaram for his 'incompetent doctors' overseeing the economy comment, saying she does not want to learn from those who gave "faulty remedies" and under whom FDI literally ran away and "cronies" fled the country after defaulting on bank loans.


"The first thing is that the global sentiment is in favour of India. Foreign investors continue to show confidence in India. That is why the country has attracted a net FDI of 24.4 billion US dollars from April to November in 2019-20 when all of us started wondering as to whether there is any way by which we can identify if there are any green shoots. Even between April and November of 2019-2020, there has been 24.4 billion US dollar FDI as compared to 21.2 billion
US dollars between April and November 2018-2019." - FM in Lok Sabha 


"The Net FPI From April to November of 2019-20 was positive at 12.6 billion US dollars as against only 8.7billion US dollars in April-November of 2018-19. That is the first indicator. The second indicator is that the announcement of the National Infrastructure Pipeline may further increase the flow of FDI into the country even for brownfield projects. Therefore, the green shoot is got to be identified, recognised and all of us are going to see its impact." 




She also listed out announcements of last year including reduction in tax rate on income generated by companies, compared steps taken by the Congress-led UPA during global financial crisis of 2008-09 and took credit for the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) cutting interest rates by as much as 135 basis points last year to boost growth from its worst showing in 11 years.

"There are seven important macroeconomic indicators which show that there are green shoots in the economy... economy is not in trouble," she said replying to the debate on the Budget 2020-21 in the lower house of Parliament.

She targeted Chidambaram in Rajya Sabha. Mr Chidambaram had on Monday said that the "economy was perilously close to collapse and was being attended by incompetent doctors".


"A lot of assumptions were being put on us... One thing I concede and that is it is certainly predisposed about not repeating faulty remedies that the UPA government gave in 2008-09. None of that will be repeated by us," she said.

Ms Sitharaman said she would take comments and suggestions made by everyone but not "when you are constantly throwing barbs at us".

"The diagnosis of what went wrong between 2008-09 and the treatment that has been offered here I would like to list out some of them," she said listing twin balance sheet crises faced by banks in 2014 as well as mounting NPAs as a fallout of the steps taken then.



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