India 2014

[jaichind]

As expected, there are stories coming out of non-Telangana AP of riots and of course suicides to protest the decision to create Telangana, just like the protest to create Telengana back in 2009-10.

[jaichind]

Latest updates.  
1) INC is in such a powerful position in Karnataka that there are situations where BJP is not running candidates but passively supporting JD(S) or KJP in various by-elections to stop INC.  Not so great for BJP as it weakens their grassroots and INC is running against JD(S) as a crypto-Modi supporter.  
2) In Bihar JD(U) leader implies that it could join INC if the UPA government gives Bihar status to get more funding due to its backwardness.  
3) In Telangana TRS faces a split where some members sensing INC might get credit for Telangana might bolt the party to join INC and ride the INC wave in 2014.  In the rest of AP, TDP is caught being for and against Telangana as it tries to stay competitive in Telangana yet still try not to be crushed by YSRCP as YSRCP loudly proclaim itself as the anti-Telangana party in the rest of AP.

[jaichind]

Latest India Today C-Voter Survey





UPA and NDA both far from majority.  If this were to take place we will have a Third Front government.

[RogueBeaver]

God forbid. If only someone had a workable idea how to reverse this Balkanization trend. Can't really decide what's worse: Third Front or BJP, for different reasons.

[Kitteh]

Couple questions: Is a third-front government possible, or would that be too loose of a coalition (even for India) to work out? And are the Communist parties bouncing back? Last I heard they had been defeated in a landslide in the state elections in some of their strongholds like West Bengal.

[jaichind]

Couple questions: Is a third-front government possible, or would that be too loose of a coalition (even for India) to work out? And are the Communist parties bouncing back? Last I heard they had been defeated in a landslide in the state elections in some of their strongholds like West Bengal.

I would imagine a third front government would be

(Left Front or TMC) + (SP or BSP) + (JD(U) or RJD) + (TDP or YSRCP) + (AIADMK or DMK) + LJP + TRS + BJD + MDMK + PMK + VCK + JD(S) + AGP + INLD + PDP + JVM + independents.  If the results are what the poll says this front will have around 140-150 seats.  Then UPA will support this front from the outside.

Left front's chances are mixed.  Really a function of how TMC does.   TMC is using old Left Front tactics in rural WB.   This could lead to a realignment in rural WB toward TMC or it could backfire on TMC. 

[jaichind]

The situation with the Indian Rupee is not going well.  The real solution are economic reforms but with UPA in trouble in opinion polls it is unlikely that would take place.  The government seems to want to use capital controls to contain this but that will work on the short run but will bad for the economy on the long run.  I suspect this will not be resolved until after the elections.  Of course it is likely the elections will produce a weak government. 

[Famous Mortimer]

Who would be PM for the Third Front?

[jaichind]

C-Voter India Today also came out with polls on Assembly elections for Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh, Delhi, and Rajasthan which are due to take place later in 2013.



AAP is the anti-corruption Aam Aadmi Party which came from the anti-corruption Anna movement back in 2011.  It has some strength in Delhi but no where else.  It is anti-INC and if anything will align with NDA.  It was thought that AAP would split the anti-INC vote but according to this poll it would still be enough to oust INC from power.  Of course INC CM Diksh**t is still popular so INC could come back.

INC is doing better in Chattisgarh than expected where INC is in disarray and the government is popular but it seems that INC and BJP are neck to neck.   Of course the rebellion of INC leader Ajit Jogi will perhaps spoil this unexpected INC comeback.  




If this is accurate then MP is stronger for INC than most would thought despite the popular BJP government there.
 
INC somewhat behind BJP in Rajasthan mostly due to the star power of Raje who was former CM and scion of the Scindia clan.  Of course another branch of the Scindia clan, Jyotiraditya Madhavrao Scindia, is in the INC, and the leader of the INC in MP.  Jyotiraditya Madhavrao Scindia is the nephew of Raje.  The Scindia clan is historically for BJP but   Jyotiraditya Madhavrao Scindia's father broke ranks and when over to INC.

[jaichind]

Who would be PM for the Third Front?

SP leader Mulayam Singh Yadav, or BSP leader Mayawati, or TMC leader Mamata Banerjee.  Perhaps JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar or Sharad Yadav since Kumar does not seem to have national aspirations.  The first three are also quite polarizing.  So perhaps a Sharad Yadav who is not as polarizing might be a good compromise candidate if JD(U) ends up in the ruling alliance.

[ag]

AAP is the anti-corruption Aam Aadmi Party which came from the anti-corruption Anna movement back in 2011.  It has some strength in Delhi but no where else.  It is anti-INC and if anything will align with NDA.  It was thought that AAP would split the anti-INC vote but according to this poll it would still be enough to oust INC from power.  Of course INC CM Diksh**t is still popular so INC could come back.

I am hearing that, if AAP is necessary for government formation in Delhi, they'd rather abstain. They do not want to support either of the alliances: there are enough anti-BJP people in it as well - and they do not want to be fracturing before the Lok Sabha election. They might let a minority government be formed by whoever is in the lead without them. In fact, if the government cannot be formed, from their standpoint it is for the better: they believe that the media is ignoring them, and screwing up government formation  in the capital would do marvels for media coverage before the Lok Sabha election. In that election they want to expand beyond Delhi - definitely to Harayana ad western UP, so they do need national media coverage.

[Gustaf]

Wouldn't Mayawati as PM be too much of an embarrassment for India for people to actually allow it?

Having heard a bit from Indians and read a bit about it I'm reluctantly leaning towards BJP for this election, all the problems with them notwithstanding.

[jaichind]

Paul Krugman does not seem to get why there is a panic in the fall of the Rupee.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/08/20/rupee-panic/

His point is that most of India's debt is not dollar denominated so "the depreciation of the rupee will presumably lead to a spike in inflation — but it should be temporary."   Of course he could have argued, correctly, that India has a large foreign exchange reserve to defend the Rupee if need so to prevent a free fall. 

What Krugman does not get is that inflation is already very high in India and this is a political problem as well.  The situation is the following.  India imports a significant chunk of its energy needs.  But as part of the political election process, there are massive subsidies from the government to domestic end user of energy.  Typically, state governments promise free power to farms to get their vote and then mostly carries it out until it gets to expensive.  This situation leads to excessive and inefficient use of energy in India.  It is clear the UPA government will not do well in the next election so the the markets expect UPA to roll out more subsidies (like the most recent Food Bill). It is also clear that NDA with Modi at the helm will find it hard to win a majority next election so the results will be a weak UPA government, a weak NDA government, or a weak Third Front government.  All three alternatives means increasing government subsidies for the next few years.  Now with QE being rolled back the Indian Rupee falling, this is triggering a vicious cycle where the Rupee falls, the cost of government subsidies rise since the government has to pay in $ for energy but keep the cost the same for energy in terms of Rupees domestically.  The markets see that the only way out is to monetize the debt so people rush to move assets out of Rupees overseas or into Gold.  Either way the Rupees falls further starting the cycle again.  With its large foreign exchange reserves the Central Bank of India and stem this slide for a while but on the long run the solution is to get rid of these subsidies which seems unlikely given the way election 2014 is shaping up.  Of course Krugman will not understand this since he seems to like all kinds of subsidies, welfare and freebies as part of government policy. 

[Hatman 🍁]

Are we going to have to refer to her as Sheila Diksh[inks]?

[GAworth]

Is the Mamata, Nitish, Naveen "Eastern bloc" talked about earlier this year gone anywhere? I know TMC had talked up the possibility since they ditched the UPA.

[jaichind]

Is the Mamata, Nitish, Naveen "Eastern bloc" talked about earlier this year gone anywhere? I know TMC had talked up the possibility since they ditched the UPA.

Not that I know of.  I am pretty sure JD(U) will hold back for a while and see which direction the political winds are blowing.  Their angle is mostly to try to get UPA government to assign "special status" for Bihar which means more subsidies and then join UPA and go to the elections telling Bihar how they brought home the bacon.

[jaichind]

A couple of by-elections took place in Karnataka where two existing JD(S) MPs had resigned to be part of the Karnataka state assembly.  There was a de facto JD(S) BJP KJP alliance to take on INC in these two JD(S) bastions where BJP and KJP did not run candidates and endorced the JD(S) candidates.  The result was a victory for INC in both.  Just to see how significant the swings are the results are

Bangalore Rural

2009
JD(S)       44.7%
BJP          32.9%
INC          17.5%

2013
INC          56.7%
JD(S)       44.3%

Mandya

2009
JD(S)       37.3%
INC         35.0%
BJP          14.0%

2013
INC          53.8%
JD(S)       46.2%

Clearly JD(S) and BJP had elements which opposed the alliance for various caste and ideological reasons defected to INC producing a victory for INC for both seats despite a grand anti-INC alliance.

Within JD(S) this is causing conflict.  JD(S) or Janata Dal(Secular) was formed in 1999 to oppose JD(U) that choose to join NDA.  So JD(S)'s DNA is anti-BJP.  Within JD(S), the leader and founder Gowda who was PM back in 1996-1997 as the head of the Third Front government still have national ambitions.  His desire is to ally with various Third Front anti-BJP forces and keep a good relationship with INC so he can become PM again.  Gowda's son Kumaraswamy has ambitions at the state level and desires to be CM which he was in 2006-2007.  He knows given inate INC strength in Karnataka, the best way to be CM is to ally with BJP, despite the hypocracy of such a move.  He did so in 2006-2007 by forming an alliance with BJP over the objections of his father which then fell apart.  Now that BJP is down on its luck again, Kumaraswamy now is for renewing an alliance with BJP defeat INC in the next state assembly elections and become CM.  These by-election results seems to vidicate Gowda's line that a JD(S) BJP alliance does not work on the ground and would only drive various vote blocks toward INC.  To be fair, INC is still in its honeymoon period so it is not clear that on the long run a JD(S)-BJP anti-INC alliance will fail.  Most likely it will due to its ideological contradictions.

In the aftermath of this election defeat Kumaraswamy was demoted by Gowda as he was asked to resign from president of the state unit of the party.  Very likely the Gowda line will be followed by JD(S) in 2014 and there be three way contests between BJP, INC and JD(S). 

There is also now talks that some elements in KJP instead of allying with BJP want to ally with INC.

[jaichind]

Radical Hindu nationalist organization VHP is trying to help BJP by trying to organize a large yatra (or march) in favor of a temple at Ayodhya which is in UP.  The Ayodhya dispute is documented at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayodhya_dispute

The Hindu belief is that the Rama, an incarnation of the Hindu god Vishnu, was born at Ayodhya at Jan 10th 5114BC between noon and 1pm at a place called Ram Janmabhoomi.  The believe is that this location is at the Babri Mosque, a mosque built by emporor Babur, the first Mughal emperor of India after destoying a Rama temple at said location.  There is dispute on if there was a temple there or not and obviously if Rama, if he existed at all, was born there in 5114BC.  Anyway, a BJP VHP mob in 1992 destroyed the Babri Mosque and after that there is a ongoing debate on if the mosque should be rebuilt or a temple built to replace it or to build both on the same site.

Anyhow, the BJP mostly squeezed whatever poliical advantage it got back in the 1990s.  BJP's decline in UP since the late 1990s is a sign of this.  

VHP is trying to stir things up mostly to help BJP.  Their logic goes like this: With Modi at the helm, what the Muslim vote will do is to vote for whatever party that is in a postion to defeat BJP which will lead to bad results for BJP.  By raising communal tensions does not damage since Modi already has poloarized the Muslim vote.  But what it will do is th get the Hindu vote behind BJP.  Also VHP will count on SP government to stop this yatra and as a result of the conflict between BJP and SP, the Muslim vote will instead vote for SP and not the party that will help defeat BJP and by that logic help BJP.  

Not sure this will work as there seems to be low enthusiasm on the various Hindu nationalist voters in UP to support this yatra since this is an old topic.  And without conflict from a large yatra to get SP to come out to stop it the VHP-BJP plan will not work.  We will see, but so far it is not working out.

[jaichind]

Food Bill passed in Lok Shabha.  Two-thirds of India’s 1.2 billion population, about 800 million people, will be guaranteed subsidised food under the scheme.  INC feel this is a game changer.  It might be true and help INC in 2014.  But this is another freebie giveaway scheme and add to the budget deficit.  This is a personal victory of Sonia Gandhi.

[jaichind]

Speaking of VHP.  VHP mobilizes Sadhus or wondering Hindu monks who have left behind all material attachments as foot soldiers for their campaigns.  

Some pictures of Sadhus and VHP leadership are





which somehow reminds me of the Jedi council

[minionofmidas]

A couple of by-elections took place in Karnataka where two existing JD(S) MPs had resigned to be part of the Karnataka state assembly.  There was a de facto JD(S) BJP KJP alliance to take on INC in these two JD(S) bastions where BJP and KJP did not run candidates and endorced the JD(S) candidates.  The result was a victory for INC in both.  Just to see how significant the swings are the results are

Bangalore Rural

2009
JD(S)       44.7%
BJP          32.9%
INC          17.5%

2013
INC          56.7%
JD(S)       44.3%

Mandya

2009
JD(S)       37.3%
INC         35.0%
BJP          14.0%

2013
INC          53.8%
JD(S)       46.2%

Clearly JD(S) and BJP had elements which opposed the alliance for various caste and ideological reasons defected to INC producing a victory for INC for both seats despite a grand anti-INC alliance.

Bangalore rural had been won by Kumaraswamy himself in 2009, and his wife was the JDS candidate in the by-election. It's a brand-new constituency created by the redistribution and actually extends into a random bit of urban southeast Bangalore.

[FredLindq]

Is all the rapes reported in western media an issue among politicians in India?!

[minionofmidas]

Is all the rapes reported in western media an issue among politicians in India?!

It's certainly a big issue in the english-medium Indian media. No idea if it goes much deeper. Probably not.

[jaichind]

Is all the rapes reported in western media an issue among politicians in India?!

Might make a difference in wealthy modern urban areas with upper middle class voters, but I suspect it makes little difference in the vast majority of rural areas.  The Food Bill is an example where the INC is pretty much writing off the urban vote, where it was successful in 2009 based on Singh and Rahul Gandhi, in 2014 and going for the rural vote.

[jaichind]

Janata Dal (United) MP from Muzaffarpur Captain (retired) Jai Narain Prasad 'Nishad' recently met Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and expressed his desire that the BJP election Campaign committee chief should become next Prime Minister of India.  Nishad, who had even organised a 'yagna' in March 2013, to seek divine intervention so that Modi could become Prime Minister, has also claimed that he is not concerned about disciplinary actions his party might take after his meeting with Modi becomes public.
"In past, I have changed five political parties and yet I got elected from the Muzaffarpur Lok Sabha seat for five terms. So I am not afraid about any party taking action against me"

Jai Narain Prasad is right.  He has been a member of five parties.  He was a member of Lok Dal, then Janata Dal, then RJD, then JD(U), then BJP, and back to JD(U).  Now he seems to want to jump back to BJP.

Of course when it comes to defections, former Karnataka CM Bangarappa  takes the cake.  He has switched parties nine times in his political career.   Bangarappa began his political career as a socialist, switched to the Congress, left to float the Karnataka Kranti Ranga, rejoined the Congress, left again to launch the Karnataka Congress Party, returned to the Congress, went to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), then joined the Samajwadi Party, and then went again back to the Congress before his last defection to JD(S) right before his death in 2011.