India 2014

[Sbane]

From what I am seeing the AAP base is composed of professionals and other educated people who are tired of criminals getting into office. As you may imagine, this means that they don't have much power outside the urban areas. So they may win in Delhi but I don't know  how much of an influence they will have outside the urban areas.

[jaichind]

Some TN electoral math.  As I mentioned before, with DMK and INC alliance not in the cards so far the TN alliances look like this (with rough vote shares)

AIADMK (28%) + CPI/CPI(3%) = 31%
BJP(3%)+MDMK(2%) = 5%
INC(8%)+DMDK(10%)+ML(3%)= 21%
DMK(22%)+PT/VCK(3%)+MMK(1%)= 26%

PMK with about 3% will for sure not go with AIADMK alliance but with INC/DMDK or DMK.  Which bloc PMK joins will give us a clue on which of the two opposition blocks (INC/DMDK or DMK) is in the best position to take on AIADMK.  The remaining votes will mostly be pro-Tamil anti-INC votes with a bias toward AIADMK.  DMK is hoping now that it broke with INC it might get some of that vote but that is unlikely.  AIADMK is now looking pretty.  Remember, AIADMK could get together with NDA/BJP after the elections but to do so before the election would be foolish.  CPI/CPM vote base is about same as BJP and whereas BJP cannot join INC/DMDK or DMK, CPI/CPM could and upset the AIADMK apple cart.

[jaichind]

It seems like in Bihar we are headed toward a RJD-INC-LJP alliance.  INC is working to rope in NCP as well.  Rahul Gandhi was for an alliance with JD(U) but his authority took a hit after the poor INC performance in the assembly elections.  Also with Lalu out of jail on bail the is INC hope that his personal charisma could counter the Modi persona in Bihar.   Adding to this is JD(U) perception that there is an anti-INC wave in India in 2014 and does not want to tie itself to INC where it could send suffer from double anti-incumbency.

I wonder if this also means that RJD-LJP would join the INC-JMM alliance in Jharkhand.  It would create a block with the largest vote base but the devil would be how seat distribution works.  It could also provoke a JVM-BJP alliance but such a marriage could also run into trouble once they start distributing seats. 

[jaichind]

In the meantime, still no government in Delhi.  The INC has indicated it will support an AAP government.  The AAP has turned to a series of town halls to get grassroots feedback on weather it should that INC support to form a minority government.

[jaichind]

Looks like AAP will take INC support to form the state government of Delhi.  BJP is fuming because they want an re-election to be held at the same time as the 2014 Lok Shabha elections.  And now with the AAP forming the government, even if it will not last long, another Delhi vote would NOT be at the same time as the 2014 Lok Shabha poll.

[jaichind]

In Jharkhand it seems we are headed for a INC-JMM-RJD alliance with INC contesting 9, JMM 4, and RJD 1 out of the 14 seats. 

[FredLindq]

Can someone do a summary of the alliances in the major states?!

[jaichind]

This is the current "expected value" of the alliances in various states

AP: "TDP+BJP" vs "INC+TRS+CPI" vs YSRCP: Advantage "INC+TRS+CPI" in Telengana and YSRCP in rest of AP
Bihar: "INC+RJD+LJP" vs BJP vs JD(U): Advantage "INC+RJD+LJP" assuming it stages together
Gujarat: INC vs BJP: Advantage BJP
Karnataka: "BJP+KJP" vs INC vs JD(S): Advantage INC
Maharastra: "BJP+SS+RPI" vs "INC+NCP": Advantage "BJP+SS+RPI"
MP: INC vs BJP: Advantage BJP
Rajasthan: INC vs BJP: Advantage BJP
TN: "AIADMK+Left" vs "DMK+PT+VCK+MMK" vs "INC+DMDK" vs "BJP+MDMK: Advantage "AIADMK+Left"
UP: "INC+RLD" vs SP vs BSP vs BJP: Advantage BSP
WB:  INC vs TMC vs Left Front vs BJP: Advantage TMC
Jharkhand: "INC+JMM+RJD" vs "JVM+JD(U)" vs BJP: Advantage "INC+JMM+RJD" if it stages together
Uttarakhand: INC vs BJP: Advantage BJP
Chattisgarh: INC vs BJP: Advantage BJP
JK: "INC+NC" vs BJP vs PDP: Advantage "INC+NC"
HP" INC vs BJP: Advantage BJP
Haryana: INC vs "BJP+HJC" vs INLD: Advantage INC
Kerala: "INC led UDF" vs "Left led LDF" vs BJP: Advantage "Left Led LDF"
Orissa: "BJD+Left+NCP" vs INC vs BJP: Advantage "BJD+Left+NCP"
Punjab: "BJP+SAD" vs INC vs BSP: Advantage "BJP+SAD"
Assam: "INC+BPF" vs AGP vs BJP vs AUDF: Advantage "INC+BPF"
Delhi: INC vs "BJP+SAD" vs AAP: Advantage "BJP+SAD"

[RogueBeaver]

Singh will retire after the election.

[FredLindq]

The first expansion of the NDA after Nitish Kumar-led JD(U)’s exit in July is expected mid-January, which marks the festivities of Pongal and Sankranti in the two southern states.

Vaiko-led MDMK and S Ramadoss-led PMK in Tamil Nadu and the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) in Andhra Pradesh are set to join the NDA.

The BJP also hopes it will successfully woo Tamil actor-turned politician Vijayakanth, who leads the DMDK and is assiduously being wooed by the Congress and the DMK too."

[jaichind]

In Karnataka, Yeddyurappa and his BJP splinter KJP merges with BJP.

As mentioned before it seems BJP-MDMK alliance in TN is a done deal.  BJP still trying to rope in PMK.

In AP, there are activities that might lead to a BJP-TDP alliance although there might be some opposition  within each of these two parties.

On the negative side of the ledger for BJP is the rise of AAP.  If, as it seems, AAP will make a push to have candidates, especially in urban areas, across India in 2014 general elections, this could hurt BJP and take the number of seats the BJP hoped to capture (which is around 170) to something like 130.

Speaking of AAP, the Telegu movie Rangam from a few years ago pretty much predicted something like AAP where a party of nobodies comes out of nowhere to win an assembly election in AP.

The link to the movie with subtitles is

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytu9C3tutI8

[FredLindq]

http://2014-elections-in-india.blogspot.se

Almost 50 seats for BJP in Uttar Pradesh.

It seems like Modi is polling off something seen as almost impossible.

[Gustaf]

Yeah, it's beginning to look possible, no?

[ag]

Kejriwal resigned in Delhi.

INC folk seem to have gone nuts. Effectively, they brought the government down on the main platform plank: the Jan Lokpal (anti-corruption monitor) bill. This is beyond anything Kejriwal could have hoped for.  They really were beginning to get into trouble in Delhi - and, lo and behold, they were put into a situation, in which there was no alternative but to resign: nobody can govern when they do not have a majority for the main thing they were elected for. INC promises of cooperation are now exposed as not worth the air they were uttered in. BJP and Congress voting together to bring the government down! What could be sweeter for the AAP?

On top of everything, the Congress folk chose to go out of their way to stress that Delhi is not a proper state and should always remember its proper subordination to the central authority (the showdown, ostensibly, was over the lack of a proper authorization from the Lok Sabha to the Delhi Assembly for passing of the bill - the authorization, which, on top of everything, is required based not on a law, but on an Interior Ministry letter). This will do miracles for their popularity in the Capital territory. Which, by the way, now, most likely, will have the repeat Assembly election simultaneously with the national polls. Sometimes one thinks certain people want to be wiped out. If that is not an example of political masochism, I do not know what is.

[Gustaf]

That's hilarious. I was thinking that AAP seemed to be waning. Having read a little about it I get the impression that BJP and Congress didn't expect this to happen.

[jaichind]

Its been a while so it is time for a update.

1) The most recent polls all have BJP at around 200 seats and INC at around 100 with NDA around 220 and UPA around 110.  If that were the case then Modi should be able to come to power but with some unstable allies.  Of course these polls does not take into account how alliances in Bihar, TN, and Telegana will play out all of which could evolve in a way to help INC and hurt BJP.    Also these projections assumes that BJP does very well in UP.  It has to be seen if that is the case once the campaign begins.  BSP is always underrated and could come to snatch a bunch of seats from BJP if the Muslim vote consolidates behind it.

2) Yes, AAP government in Delhi resigned.  AAP government was running into all sort of issues of trying to realize its election promises which in turn hurt other key voting blocs.  Going out playing a role of a martyr would help fetch votes among the lower classes but hurt them with middle class urban voters.  I think AAP is en route to sweeping Delhi in LS elections mostly on the basis of the INC voting bloc shifting their vote to AAP.  In that sense this helps INC as the INC was going to get 0 in Delhi anyway so it rather it be AAP 7/6 BJP 0/1 than BJP 7 INC 0.  Outside of Delhi this move most likely will hurt INC more as AAP's appeal to urban BJP voters would diminish.  

3) As of today Telengana was passed in the Lower House.  Now it just has to pass the Upper House and Telengana willd come into play despite heavy opposition in the rest of AP.  On this one INC actually outmaneuvered the BJP.  The BJP has always had Telengana in its platform so it had no choice but provide the decisive vote in favor of Telengana.  So BJP will get the blame in rest of AP where TDP might drop plans to ally with BJP and go with the Left instead.  Or else it will lose the anti-Telengana vote to the YSRCP.  INC will be wiped out in the rest of AP but now a INC-TRS alliance will sweep Telengana.  On the long run the BJP has a bright future in Telengana where it does have a base but with TDP and YSRCP being anti-Telengana, it will be INC-TRS vs BJP in Telengana it the INC-TRS will sweep.  In rest of AP it will be TDP vs YSRCP and with TDP most likely not having an alliance with BJP due to the Telengana factor it will most likely lose out to YSRCP.  In this round the INC will be wiped out in rest of AP but in this realignment INC might become a OBC based party.  Traditionally INC in AP is the party of the Reddy caste (a upper caste) plus Dalits.  Both these voting blocs are clearly going over the YSRCP.  The OBC voting blocs that were with INC (mainly the Kapus) seems to be staying with INC.  This is the same voting bloc that TDP tends to be based from.  So in this sense this INC YSRCP split might work to the disadvantage of TDP as INC is free now to fight TDP for the OBC vote.  If that does not work on the long run, after this Telengana issue blows over in an election cycle of two the INC and YSRCP could still just merge.

4) In TN it is still AIADMK+Left vs DMK+VCK+PT vs BJP+MDMK vs INC.  Not clear where PMK and DMDK will go with.  If these two parties have national aspirations then it is clear that going with BJP is the way to goal.  If their goal is the next TN assembly elections then trying to find the best deal in an anti-AIADMK bloc is the way to go in which case it would be DMK front or INC.  DMK has ruled out a grand alliance of DMK, INC and DMDK so in that sense AIADMK is destined to win, the only question is by how much.

5) INC did not project Rahul Gandhi as PM candidate.  This pretty much means they have written off the 2014 elections as lost and it is mostly about Rahul Gandhi rebuilding the party after the expected defeat to fight another day.  Going forward the INC's goal is to minimize the BJP vote and seat count to make sure a weak NDA government comes to power as as it falters the revival of INC will come about sooner. 

[ag]

Why would AAP be hurt among the middle class urban voters? They resigned, having been defeated on what was their original well-established objective, their main reason for existence, in a way. Given that, it is not like they had a realistic option not to resign (now, they may have maneuvered the other parties into overthrowing the government - but that is no such an easy point to make).

Of course, they will be running on a hardcore anti-corruption platform. But they were always planning to run on a hardcore anti-corruption platform - nothing changed here. Or is it supposed that the anti-corruption plank is very unpopular among the middle class urban voters?

From what I understand, their objective is to make the election in UP and Maharashtra as unpredictable as possible, preventing the formerly INC vote flowing to BJP. They also want to displace INC in as many places as possible as the runner-up (there is a rumor they might be going strongly out in Gujarat, where, naturally, they would not gain any seats, but might come second to BJP in a few places).

[jaichind]

Why would AAP be hurt among the middle class urban voters? They resigned, having been defeated on what was their original well-established objective, their main reason for existence, in a way. Given that, it is not like they had a realistic option not to resign (now, they may have maneuvered the other parties into overthrowing the government - but that is no such an easy point to make).

Of course, they will be running on a hardcore anti-corruption platform. But they were always planning to run on a hardcore anti-corruption platform - nothing changed here. Or is it supposed that the anti-corruption plank is very unpopular among the middle class urban voters?

From what I understand, their objective is to make the election in UP and Maharashtra as unpredictable as possible, preventing the formerly INC vote flowing to BJP. They also want to displace INC in as many places as possible as the runner-up (there is a rumor they might be going strongly out in Gujarat, where, naturally, they would not gain any seats, but might come second to BJP in a few places).

You mostly have it right on what the APP game-plan is.  Main reason why AAP might lose urban middle income votes is mostly because various stunts Arvind Kejriwal pulled as CM like doing a 33 hours sit in protest against the police force.  Gives the impression that AAP is not serious about governing.

[jaichind]

Latest ABP News-Nielsen  survey in Bihar and UP has Bihar (BJP 21, JDU 9, RJD 5, INC 2, LJP 1, others 2) and UP (BJP 40, INC 7, RLD 4, SP 14, BSP 13, AAP 1, others 1).  If RJD-INC-LJP alliance forms in Bihar it will be (BJP 16, JDU 8, RJD-INC-LJP 14, others 2)

A  India Today Group-CVoter poll in AP after the passage of Telangana bill has

Seemandhra (YSRCP 18, TDP 6, INC 1) and Telangana (INC 1, TRS 14, BJP 1, AIMIM 1).  Of course this assumes no TRS-INC alliance. 

[Maez]

Is there polling for the AP Legislative elections? As far as I remember, Eenadu had suggested (a couple of weeks ago) that the seat count was close between the TDP and YSRCP in Seemandhra and Rayalseema combined, and I'd imagine the passage of the bill would affect if the TDP would ally with the BJP after all.

[jaichind]

Is there polling for the AP Legislative elections? As far as I remember, Eenadu had suggested (a couple of weeks ago) that the seat count was close between the TDP and YSRCP in Seemandhra and Rayalseema combined, and I'd imagine the passage of the bill would affect if the TDP would ally with the BJP after all.

I have not seen any polling for assembly elections.  My understanding is whereas INC-TRS would do well in Telangana for the LS elections and in fact sweep it, the BJP will do well in the assembly elections and give INC-TRS a run for its money.

BJP voting for Telengana poses a problem for TDP.  In theory TDP-BJP alliance makes sense.  TDP strong in Seemandhra but weak in Telangana with BJP the opposite.  Main issue is TDP pretty much wrote off Telangana this election cycle and an alliance with BJP loses the Left vote and the Muslim vote but of course gains the urban middle class vote BJP which makes it an even trade.  But the YSRCP is wiping up anti-Telangana sentiment in the upcoming elections and having BJP with it the TDP risks losing the anti-Telangana vote whose size is unknown but feared to be large by TDP.  Of course BJP has the opposite problem, an alliance with an anti-Telegana TDP which will be having competitive tirades against Telangana with YSRCP in Seemandhra means that an alliance with TDP will cost BJP in Telangana.

I always felt INC came up with the way to deal with this which is to come up with two INCs, one pro and one anti Telangana.  INC is the pro-Telangana INC party and YSRCP is the anti-Telangana INC.

[jaichind]

Shocking development.  A senior LJP leader has indicated that LJP will ally with BJP in Bihar.  This is one more the cynical developments one could imagine.  LJP was formed as a JD(U) splinter in 2002 by Ram Vilas Paswan to protest the riots in Gujarat under the leadership of Modi and protest that JD(U) should not continue to ally with BJP.  In other words, LJP was formed as response to JD(U) being in the same alliance with Modi.  Now with JD(U) actually having broken with BJP, the LJP forms an alliance with BJP.

The reason seems obvious, LJP prefers an alliance with RJD-INC but with RJD so eager to get INC on board it seems that RJD was willing to sacrifice the number of seats allocated to LJP.  LJP did seem to looking for options by talking to JD(U) but I guess this move is based on perhaps a better deal from BJP and also trying to join a winning team.  Of course Paswan has not come up to confirm this yet so this could still be a ploy to get the maximum concessions from RJD.

Also it is interesting that the BJP will also open to such an alliance.  It seems to indicate that BJP does not believe the polls which has it ahead in Bihar and believes the road to victory is through the right caste equations.  BJP is strong with upper castes and some OBCs but weak with MBC and Dalits.  BJP just tied up with JD(U) splinter RSLP which has some strength in OBC in Bihar giving it 3 out of 40 seats.  LJP has some strength with MBC and Dalits and could augment the BJP base.  For this deal to be worth its while for LJP, I have to imagine that that LJP would get something like 6-8 seats.  If so then BJP's assumptions about its prospects in Bihar might be more pessimistic than the polls seems to indicate.  

[Gustaf]

Haha, I just love Indian politics. Though I'm glad I don't have to support any party there. I guess AAP would be the best of a bad bunch.

It'd be interesting to see Congress take a beating, something that's looking increasingly likely.

[jaichind]

More news.

It seems the LJP parliamentary board has voted to start alliance talks with BJP.  LJP leader Paswan indicates that this is not locked down yet but an alliance with BJP is an option.  Remember, this is the same Paswan that was running on such an anti-BJP pro-Muslim line back in 2005 Bihar Assembly elections that he campaigned with a Bin Ladin look-alike to drum up Muslim support for LJP.

Also it intially seems that RJD in Bihar took a serious blow when 13 out of 22 MLA defected to JD(U).  Then it turns out 9 of the 13 had their signature forged and that only 4 MLAs were in the rebel group.  4 MLAs is too small to get by the anti-defection laws for them to defect to JD(U).  But the JD(U) speaker seems to have allowed this caused all sort of legal/political conflict.  Clearly all these developments are a blow to RJD-INC in Bihar where it seems like a  RJD-INC-LJP alliance would have a quite respectable showing in the upcoming election.  This looks a less certain now.

In TN, it seems that DMDK is going with BJP-MDMK.  BJP is also trying get PMK into the alliance but it seems that the number of seats demanded by all these allies might be in conflict.  Out of 40 seats in TN-Pondicherry, DMDK wanted 20 but BJP could only give 12.  DMDK went down to 14 but I think in the end it might be 12.  PMK wants 14.  But BJP wants to run a decent number of candidates as well so some working out has to be done.  It seems that DMDK wants to have an influence in national politics so it is going with BJP instead of INC as INC does have a larger voting bloc than BJP in TN.

[All Along The Watchtower]

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Election schedules, maps, etc. here:

http://ibnlive.in.com/news/india-gets-ready-for-worlds-biggest-election-to-begin-from-april-7/456033-81.html