India 2014

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Oh, they have heard the name 'Hitler' alright but if they know anything about him it's that the Britishers fought him just as they were finally being forced from India.
Which is obviously not something negative.

Yes, this for sure is a factor.  Most people in India know Hilter as a leader of Germany that weakened the UK so much they had to leave india.  One other reason Hitler is gaining popularity in India is he is precieved as a strong leader with principles, something that seems to be lacking in Indian politics.  This is where I make a link between RSS and Hitler in the sense the RSS projection of its ideals is around the strong leader.  I am not even here to attack this political view since in some circumstances I might be sympathetic  to this view.  I am merely pointing out links between RSS world view and various pan-Fascist views.   For example RSS projects the concept of  ‘One Nation, One Leader’ and ‘Hindustan belongs to the Hindus’ which were part of its views when it was founded in the 1920s.

On a funnier note, there is a guy in Meghalaya which is a small northeastern state in India that has the name Adolf Hitler and runs in elections for state assembly last few election cycles.  Also during the 2002-2008 period, the LJP in Bihar would use a Bin Laden look-alike in campaign rallies in Muslim majority districts.  This was a period when Bin Laden was popular in certain segments in Muslim India more as a fighter for Muslim interests against the "Evil Empire."

I think you could be right about them trying to project themselves as strong, principled leaders using Hitler's imagery. And as has been pointed out, Indians viewed the British with obvious disdain during that time and the war with Germany weakened the British. So why should Indians view them as some greater evil than the British? And your enemies enemies are your friend after all.

Now lest someone assume that this means Hindu nationalists don't like Jews, or even the zionist movement, you would be quite wrong. While Hindu nationalists don't like Muslims and Christians (at least missionaries), they are quite fond of zionists. I think it's because of their struggle with Muslims and also the fact that Jews don't try to convert people. Again, the enemy of the enemy is my friend.

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Well, most ultra-right parties in Europe are increasingly pro-Israel as well. So, in that respect, there is no inconsistency here.

Yeah, but the right wing in India is quite fond of Jews, which I don't think is true of the European right wing. I think it is because they are the "model minority" who don't convert people. And I actually agree with the BJP on this, especially on missionary activity in tribal areas. It should be stopped or at least heavily regulated.

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Also to guide the conversation back to Modi, I don't know what the hell he is doing. As has been pointed out, nobody who isn't already tightly associated with the NDA wants anything to do with Hindutva. Of course there are parties who will give outside support to the BJP if they feel they can get more power at the center than with Congress. But it becomes less and less likely if Modi acts like this. He has to advertise Gujarat's economic performance and lack of corruption, not their pogroms. That is the only way the BJP can get enough outside support to take control. And the base doesn't need to hear the red meat to come out big for Modi.

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Also to guide the conversation back to Modi, I don't know what the hell he is doing. As has been pointed out, nobody who isn't already tightly associated with the NDA wants anything to do with Hindutva. Of course there are parties who will give outside support to the BJP if they feel they can get more power at the center than with Congress. But it becomes less and less likely if Modi acts like this. He has to advertise Gujarat's economic performance and lack of corruption, not their pogroms. That is the only way the BJP can get enough outside support to take control. And the base doesn't need to hear the red meat to come out big for Modi.

But pogroms is THE fun of it. What else is the top job for?

Economic reforms hopefully. The last BJP government actually got a lot done. The cell phone boom has changed the way business is done in India for the poor. The congress party has been hamstrung by its allies like the CPM at first and then the bitch Mamata in this term. Bengal is screwing up the rest of India.

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Is the BJP even going to seriously contest West Bengal? They may run a candidate in Kolkata somewhere but I doubt anything much beyond that. I wonder where that BJP vote will go. It very well could go to the INC since Mamata is not popula with the BJP type crowd in WB.

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The swing towards the BJP in West Bengal is likely due to the upper caste conservative anti-left vote swinging from TMC to the BJP. In Bihar, perhaps it is due to that same constituency switching from voting for the JD, which was with BJP at the time, to the BJP.

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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.

What?! :-) Did you answer another question?

I think his point is that the types of areas where it would make a difference aren't really being contested anyways. I think that is right, we will see a huge swing away from Congress in the cities, at least as things stand currently.

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I don't think the rapes will matter politically.

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It does seem like good news for the BJP. I am really sad about the 2004 election results considering what has happened over the last 9 years. If Vajpayee would have won, I think even more reforms could have been pushed through. Instead, Sonia Gandhi, and other assorted retards such as Mamata Banerjee have basically brought the country back to it's knees again. I don't blame Manmohan Singh of course. If he had actual power, India would be fine. But he doesn't. Sonia does. Other leaders such as Mamata do. I wish Vajpayee would have gotten 5 more years instead of Modi getting them, but I guess that's how it's going to be.

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Lalu Prasad has been expelled from Lok Sabha.

lol

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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.

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/2014/03/19/indian-stocks-rally-ahead-of-2014-general-elections-fuelled-by-hope/

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/2014/03/19/indian-stocks-rally-ahead-of-2014-general-elections-fuelled-by-hope/

Well, the fascist government in India seems increasingly certain. I just hope, they are sufficiently constrained with allies needed to form a majority. Still, I want a different globe.

Right.....because markets always rise when they think an extremist, unstable government is coming into power.

Westerners need to chill out about the BJP. Modi is a dick of course, but the BJP really isn't worse than most western right wing parties.

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/2014/03/19/indian-stocks-rally-ahead-of-2014-general-elections-fuelled-by-hope/

Well, the fascist government in India seems increasingly certain. I just hope, they are sufficiently constrained with allies needed to form a majority. Still, I want a different globe.

Right.....because markets always rise when they think an extremist, unstable government is coming into power.

Westerners need to chill out about the BJP. Modi is a dick of course, but the BJP really isn't worse than most western right wing parties.

Srsly?

Srsly. Of course maybe you were thinking of the RSS or SS.

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/2014/03/19/indian-stocks-rally-ahead-of-2014-general-elections-fuelled-by-hope/

Well, the fascist government in India seems increasingly certain. I just hope, they are sufficiently constrained with allies needed to form a majority. Still, I want a different globe.

Right.....because markets always rise when they think an extremist, unstable government is coming into power.

Westerners need to chill out about the BJP. Modi is a dick of course, but the BJP really isn't worse than most western right wing parties.

That is the problem: it might be a stable extremist government. The best hope, at this point, it turns out to be unstable.

I do not like BJP too much, but I could live with it. But Modi is beyond the pale.

Modi is running in his economic record in Gujarat as far as I can tell, and Gujarat is one of the best managed states in India, if not the best. It is not unnatural that people will be attracted to his candidacy. I can sort of see your point about the crazies being emboldened if the BJP had a majority, but an unstable government just defeats the purpose of why Modi was elected since most parties just want to suck the treasury dry for the benefit of their castes. Only a BJP- AAP alliance might be able to get anything productive done.

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/2014/03/19/indian-stocks-rally-ahead-of-2014-general-elections-fuelled-by-hope/

Well, the fascist government in India seems increasingly certain. I just hope, they are sufficiently constrained with allies needed to form a majority. Still, I want a different globe.

Right.....because markets always rise when they think an extremist, unstable government is coming into power.

Westerners need to chill out about the BJP. Modi is a dick of course, but the BJP really isn't worse than most western right wing parties.

That is the problem: it might be a stable extremist government. The best hope, at this point, it turns out to be unstable.

I do not like BJP too much, but I could live with it. But Modi is beyond the pale.

Modi is running in his economic record in Gujarat as far as I can tell, and Gujarat is one of the best managed states in India, if not the best. It is not unnatural that people will be attracted to his candidacy. I can sort of see your point about the crazies being emboldened if the BJP had a majority, but an unstable government just defeats the purpose of why Modi was elected since most parties just want to suck the treasury dry for the benefit of their castes. Only a BJP- AAP alliance might be able to get anything productive done.

As far as I am coserned, the only purpose of a Modi election is a pact with the devil. Modi being able to do anything is a crime against humanity. Some things should never be forgiven or forgotten.  Whatever he wants to do for the economy is irrelevant.

I think Modi's involvement with the riots are way overblown but whatever. I am just pointing out that he his certainly not stressing hindutva in this election. This election is not about that. I still hope the BJP choose someone else than Modi but I certainly hope the BJP wins decisively. Perhaps with some alliance members who force someone else other than Modi to become PM. That could be a best case scenario.

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/saritharai/2014/03/19/indian-stocks-rally-ahead-of-2014-general-elections-fuelled-by-hope/

Well, the fascist government in India seems increasingly certain. I just hope, they are sufficiently constrained with allies needed to form a majority. Still, I want a different globe.

Right.....because markets always rise when they think an extremist, unstable government is coming into power.

Westerners need to chill out about the BJP. Modi is a dick of course, but the BJP really isn't worse than most western right wing parties.

That is the problem: it might be a stable extremist government. The best hope, at this point, it turns out to be unstable.

I do not like BJP too much, but I could live with it. But Modi is beyond the pale.

Modi is running in his economic record in Gujarat as far as I can tell, and Gujarat is one of the best managed states in India, if not the best. It is not unnatural that people will be attracted to his candidacy. I can sort of see your point about the crazies being emboldened if the BJP had a majority, but an unstable government just defeats the purpose of why Modi was elected since most parties just want to suck the treasury dry for the benefit of their castes. Only a BJP- AAP alliance might be able to get anything productive done.

As far as I am coserned, the only purpose of a Modi election is a pact with the devil. Modi being able to do anything is a crime against humanity. Some things should never be forgiven or forgotten.  Whatever he wants to do for the economy is irrelevant.

I think Modi's involvement with the riots are way overblown but whatever. I am just pointing out that he his certainly not stressing hindutva in this election. This election is not about that. I still hope the BJP choose someone else than Modi but I certainly hope the BJP wins decisively. Perhaps with some alliance members who force someone else other than Modi to become PM. That could be a best case scenario.

As far as I am concerned, there is only one thing that Modi could do that would reconcile me with him (short of doing the right thing and committing suicide, of course - but that he should have done long ago). He should anonymously retire into a very distant monastery and take a vow of never uttering a word and never showing his face to any human being.

Conditional on India electing him as a PM, of course, I will sincerely hope his government is disastrous.

Now Kalwejt will come and say that I am losing my mind

Why would you wish for the continued impoverishment of hundreds of millions of people? Ok, you hate Modi but isn't that a little extreme? Do you even realize how much easier life has become for the poor after the telecom revolution that allowed them to get access to telephones? That was done by the BJP government. Also, roads have become much better in India and that is another accomplishment of the previous BJP government.

Vajpayee was a much better PM than Manmohan Singh, although a lot of that has to do with the fact that the idiot Sonia Gandhi is the real PM, not Singh. I really respect him a lot, and if he wasn't constrained by the idiots around him he would have been a great PM, but that is not the reality on the ground.

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One thing about Gujarat that you must keep in mind is that they didn't have the advantage of having a big city like Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai or Chennai in their state. That is what make their growth impressive, while West Bengal has squandered most of the opportunities it had. Ahmedabad is a medium size city at best and is overshadowed by other cities such as Bangalore and Hyderabad. No one should expect a state like that to have a lot of FDI. Speaking of Haryana, basically all the growth there is from Gurgaon which happened mostly because of the growth of Delhi.

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One thing about Gujarat that you must keep in mind is that they didn't have the advantage of having a big city like Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai or Chennai in their state. That is what make their growth impressive, while West Bengal has squandered most of the opportunities it had. Ahmedabad is a medium size city at best and is overshadowed by other cities such as Bangalore and Hyderabad. No one should expect a state like that to have a lot of FDI. Speaking of Haryana, basically all the growth there is from Gurgaon which happened mostly because of the growth of Delhi.

The city of Ahmedabad proper is bigger than Chennai proper. Comparing metro areas, Ahmedabad is indeed a bit smaller - but it is still the 7th largest metro area in India. A tiny town the size of Madrid.

Your first sentence is irrelevant. That would be like saying Jacksonville is a bigger city than San Francisco. Metro areas are all that matter. Also, if you look at the population in 2001 versus 2011, you would see that Ahmedabad has been growing rapidly in the last decade.

My point is that after the British left, the four major cities of India were in an advantageous position in comparison to the rest of the country. And even until the recent past, the four metros are what got most of the attention. One would figure most of the FDI to flow to these places, and for the most part it has. No one talks about the investment boom in Patna or Lucknow, which are comparable cities to Ahmedabad, historically speaking.

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One thing about Gujarat that you must keep in mind is that they didn't have the advantage of having a big city like Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai or Chennai in their state. That is what make their growth impressive, while West Bengal has squandered most of the opportunities it had. Ahmedabad is a medium size city at best and is overshadowed by other cities such as Bangalore and Hyderabad. No one should expect a state like that to have a lot of FDI. Speaking of Haryana, basically all the growth there is from Gurgaon which happened mostly because of the growth of Delhi.

The city of Ahmedabad proper is bigger than Chennai proper. Comparing metro areas, Ahmedabad is indeed a bit smaller - but it is still the 7th largest metro area in India. A tiny town the size of Madrid.

Your first sentence is irrelevant. That would be like saying Jacksonville is a bigger city than San Francisco. Metro areas are all that matter. Also, if you look at the population in 2001 versus 2011, you would see that Ahmedabad has been growing rapidly in the last decade.

My point is that after the British left, the four major cities of India were in an advantageous position in comparison to the rest of the country. And even until the recent past, the four metros are what got most of the attention. One would figure most of the FDI to flow to these places, and for the most part it has. No one talks about the investment boom in Patna or Lucknow, which are comparable cities to Ahmedabad, historically speaking.

Bangalore is not on your list of 4 major cities. And they are doing fine, it seems. Same with Hyderabad. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever why "most of the FDI <should> flow to" the other four cities.

Uhh, traditionally Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata were considered the 4 major metros. Certainly true for the first 50 years of India's existence. Then you had cities like Hyderabad, Bangalore and yes, Ahmedabad, rise to challenge that paradigm, especially with regards to Kolkata due to their commie governance.

Also, of course most investment flows to the major cities. That doesn't mean smaller cities can't get investment, but they are at more of a disadvantage and have to make up for it. Why has Ahmedabad gotten so much more investment and growth than other comparable cities like Patna or Lucknow?

I don't understand why we are debating this. Gujarat has obviously capitalized very well on the opportunities they have had. Of course they are not alone. I didn't mean to imply that, but Gujarat is definitely in the top and a state to emulate. That doesn't mean you need to go out there and immediately murder a 1,000 Muslims. Take the good, leave the bad etc etc.

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Feeling a little hyperbolic this morning?

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Feeling a little hyperbolic this morning?

No. Just dislike murderers.

Oh, your post is just amusing because Congress/caste party economic policies actually do force  many people to leave India.

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Jaichind, upper caste people are more upset at OBC reservations than with caste rivalry. As long as the BJP is perceived as the anti-reservation party (whether or not they are), they will get upper caste votes. At least in the cities, I can guarantee upper caste votes flowing heavily to the BJP (with a big swing from 2009 as we all know). Maybe things are different in the rural areas? I guess we will find out.

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Feeling a little hyperbolic this morning?

No. Just dislike murderers.

Oh, your post is just amusing because Congress/caste party economic policies actually do force  many people to leave India.

Here it is not about economics, but about being alive, unfortunately. Mind what I am saying: if Modi is PM, he will spill blood. And a lot of it.

I like the "160 club" plan and considering the fact that BJP does tend to overpoll, that could end up happening.

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Although AG, why are you so concerned about Modi spilling blood? Even if the BJP does really well, they will need allies. And the only way he will get those allies is by tamping down on the Hindutva, which is precisely what has been done in this election. Of course it is going on at the grasroots level in UP and Bihar where the BJP needs the hick vote, but they can't form a national coalition based on that. They can only form it based on economic progress, which is what Modi and the BJP has been hammering the Congress on. So why would he ruin that coalition with anti-muslim violence?

Anyways, here is an interesting article on the place of Hindutva and the BJP this year:
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/a-hindutva-variant-of-neoliberalism/article5868196.ece

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