Chief Minister Mr. Trivendra Singh Rawat and Union Agriculture Minister Mr. Radha Mohan Singh, under the ‘Rashtriya Gokul Mission’ Yojana inaugurated the Sex Sorted Semen laboratory at Deep Frozen Semen Production Centre Shyampur, Rishikesh.

This would ensure that the cows inseminated with ‘sexed semen’  give birth only to female calves. Sexed semen technology is a breeding technology about preselecting the sex of offspring by sorting or separating the X-sperms from Y-sperms. This will help to produce more cows than bulls.

“In normal breeding, there are 50-50 chances that, we either get a bull or a cow. With sexed semen, in majority cases one gets a female progeny,” said officials of Agriculture Ministry. Union Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh has laid the foundation of the country’s first sex semen production centre at Rishikesh. The Centre is being set up as part of the Rashtriya Gokul Mission.

“The Centre has planned to set up 10 more such sorted semen centre across the country and global tender has been floated to this effect,” Singh said. According to officials, the technology is being adopted for this centre, was developed by the United States, to produce more cows than bulls. The project is being undertaken to increase milk productivity and the cow population.

Officials said that in sex sorted semen technology, the fractions of X-bearing (female) and Y-bearing (male) sperm are modified from the natural mix through sorting and selection. The new semen mix, which is formed, when impregnated will only yield female calves in almost 90% of the cases. The sorting process basically involves exploiting the differences in deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) content between X-chromosome-bearing and Y-chromosome-bearing sperms. The former contains slightly more DNA, with the difference ranging from 3.6% to 4.2%, depending upon the breed of the cattle or buffalo. The process of sorting is done either by passing the sperm cells through a laser beam or by staining sperm with a DNA-binding fluorescent dye.

Data from the 19th livestock census shows that while the cattle population has dipped by 4.1 per cent in 2012 from 2007 (previous census period), the buffalo population has grown by 3.19 per cent during the same period. Further, the study notes that the percentage changes in milch buffalo population during the period 2003-07 and 2007-12 has increased by 46 per cent in rural areas.

“Cow is a better animal than buffalo to increase the farmers’ income. Cow can give you a better jump in milk yield and is more amenable to upgrading in breeding than a buffalo,” officials said.

Writer: Rajesh Kumar

Courtesy: The Pioneer

Rajnath Singh on Thursday said it’s time to end combat operations in J&K. The matter would be reviewed thoroughly and discussed with Pak to extend or withdraw after the month of Ramzan.  

He sought Pakistan’s cooperation in combating terrorism and counselled the neighbouring country to take India’s help if it is unable to stop terror activities from its soil.

The Home Minister reiterated his offer of talks with separatist leaders. He said a dialogue needed right-minded people to succeed and not necessarily the like-minded people. “Everything is encompassed in this sentence. The right-minded people must come forward,” he said and added that talks could be held with everyone.

On the possible extension of Center’s decision to stop initiation of counter-terrorism operations during the holy month of Ramadhan, the Home Minister said that the issue would be thoroughly discussed in security review meetings. “All options are on the table. No possibility can be ruled out,” he declared.

Rajnath arrived here on 2-day visit to take stock of the security and developmental scenario. This was his first visit after the Center announced unilateral cessation of combat operations in the backdrop of holy month of Ramzan. The Home Minister chaired a security review meeting and held separate meeting with Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti who is chairperson of the Unified Command Headquarters.

He said that the Center has appointed its representative (Dineshwar Sharma) to hold talks in Kashmir and whosoever was interested in dialogue must approach him. “So far as question of dialogue is concerned, we have appointed special representative for this purpose. We have not sent him for holidaying. He has arrived 11 times. I want to repeat my appeal to people to come forward for talks. We can talk to anyone,” he said.

He said the BJP Government was firmly committed to solve the problems of Kashmir and not to let it linger on. “We don’t want that another generation is lost in the vortex of violence,” he said.

Referring to acts of violence in Kashmir during the ceasefire period he questioned the intentions of the perpetrators. “Those who cannot stop their activities during the month of Ramzan, cant we call their intentions contaminated,” he asked.

He said that it was understandable as to why Pakistan is allowing its soil to be used for terror activities. “WE have asked Pakistan to stop terror activities from its soil. If Pakistan is not able to stop it, why it is not taking help from the neighbouring country,” he said.

He said that terrorism has no religion and it is difficult to say when and whom it is going to devour.

He said the Central Government will take all measures to overcome the obstacles to bring lasting peace in Kashmir. He lauded the role of security forces including Army and Police who have worked with utmost restraint. He gave a detailed description of strengthening police and central security forces in Jammu and Kashmir.

Rajnath said the Central Government is profoundly concerned about the future of J&K youth and development of the state as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s mantra that he espoused from the precincts of Red Fort. He said Modi’s words “not by bullet or abuse, only by embracing Kashmiris” remains core spirit of the BJP Government.

Home Minister said the Centre decided to withdraw cases against those youngsters misled into stone pelting as it was concerned about the future of Jammu and Kashmir’s youth.

Singh appealed to the youth to harness their immense talent and not to tread the path of destruction. He said the Centre and the State Government had initiated several schemes to help them secure their future.

Writer: Khursheed vani

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The BJP Government talks about undertaking corruption and presents transparency by the means of new agendas.

The pervasiveness of money power and corruption in the political and governance process, as the attempts by the BJP to buy MLAs in the aftermath of the Karnataka Assembly election confirmed, is intense. The Government talks big on taking on graft but its actions betray a very different agenda. The Electoral Bonds Scheme is a prime example of its hypocrisy.

The touted motive

The Electoral Bonds Scheme, which was introduced on January 2, 2018 is a perfect example of the duplicitous nature of the Government. In a Press note titled “Why Electoral Bonds are Necessary?” the Finance Minister of India, Arun Jaitley, said “as against a total non-transparency in the present system of cash donations where the donor, the done, the quantum of donations and the nature of expenditure are all undisclosed, some element of transparency would be introduced in as much as all donors declare in their accounts the amount of bonds that they have purchased and all parties declare the quantum of bonds that they have received”. Therefore, the Press note seems to give us the impression that while introducing absolute transparency in the political funding process is difficult, the BJP wishes to introduce some amount of transparency to the funding process, which is why the Scheme has been introduced. In reality, however, if one examines the amendments made to the other laws in India, pursuant to the introduction of the Scheme, a truer and much more somber picture begins to appear.

How the Scheme works

The Scheme permits any person who is a citizen of India or is an entity incorporated/established in India to purchase an electoral bond in favour of certain political party within a period of 10 days during the time frames specified by the government. This electoral bond, which has been purchased, may then be encashed by political parties by depositing the bonds within in the political party’s designated bank account. In this regard, in order to appreciate how this Scheme actually encourages a lack of transparency it is important to examine the manner in which funding by way of electoral bonds is to be disclosed by political parties compared to other sources of funding.

In this regard, an examination of the Representation of People Act, 1951 (RP Act) and the Income Tax Act, 1961 (I-T Act) is illuminating.  The RP Act, inter alia, deals with the conduct of political parties including the funding of political parties. Section 29C of the RP Act requires political parties to prepare a report of all contributions received by a political party in excess of Rs 20,000 from a person or a company in a financial year and to submit this report to the Election Commission. After the introduction of the Scheme and amendments introduced under the Finance Act, 2017, the RP Act now creates an exemption to this reporting requirement for contributions made in the form of electoral bonds to political parties. While, the Scheme specifies that the know your customer (KYC) norms of a bank will apply to the buyers of an electoral bond, this does not help introduce any real transparency because the Election Commission will be unable to access this data which is the confidential information of banks.

In effect therefore, the Election Commission will have little to no information on the contributions received by political parties received in the form of electoral bonds. Another law that has been amended to further discourage transparency is the I-T Act. Prior to the amendment under the Finance Act, 2017, in order to avail tax benefits and reliefs under the Act, a political party was required to maintain a record of each contribution that was over Rs 20,000. After the amendment, the contributions made to a political party by way of electoral bonds have been excluded from the ambit of this requirement. Therefore, in order to avail reliefs under the I-T Act, no such record is required to be maintained by political parties if they are funded through electoral bonds.

It is therefore obvious, that while the government made claims that it was introducing this Scheme to bring greater transparency, in reality the government has made the entire system more opaque and attempted to fool the ordinary citizen by glossing over these unpleasant details.

How do we stem the rot?

While it is important to critically analyze the Government for its lack of drive and motivation in tackling corruption and introducing transparency in the political system, it is also important to suggest measures that in my opinion can help stem the rot of corruption in our system.

One such measure is a shift in the approach of our investigative agencies towards investigating and prosecuting corruption. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is the premier investigating agency in India that typically investigates cases of corruption in India. Currently the CBI looks into all cases of corruption across departments and more importantly across the entire spectrum of public officials in our system. In case of the Indian police service, this means that allegations of corruption against a police constable as well as a Director General of Police are investigated by our investigating agencies. While there is no denying that all acts of corruption are condemnable and should be dealt with sternly, our primary goal should be to find the most efficient way to tackle corruption as comprehensively as possible.

In order to achieve this objective, it is my opinion that more focus should be placed on investigating and prosecuting high level Government officials like Joint Secretary & above (Equivalent Rank) as well as MLA’s and MP’s. By ensuring that high-ranking corrupt officials are brought to justice and honest, competent officers occupy higher positions of responsibility it is likely that such competent, honest individuals will implement practices and policies that encourage transparency and reduce corruption in the entire department and therefore help ensure that day to day corruption that ordinary citizens face are minimized as well. By adopting such an approach, the CBI can use its resources in a more focused, efficient manner rather than spreading itself thin chasing every instance of corruption.

As the saying goes, sunlight is the best disinfectant. So another way in which corruption can be reduced is by introducing greater transparency in our system. The Right to Information Act was a big step in this direction. In order to move forward in this direction, we should strive to ensure that all government documents (other than such matters which are sensitive or relating to national security) should be accessible to the public. Such a move will help ensure that the citizens of the country to provide a check against an abuse of power in the Government.

At the end of the day, we must remember that the problem of corruption is a massive problem that cannot be tackled by sweeping statements or empty gestures. It requires a sustained committed approach and should not be reduced to a marketing campaign. However, I am aware that the BJP and the Prime Minister are big advocates of the hashtag culture so I humbly request Prime Minister Modi to undertake this #seriousaboutcorruption challenge.

(The writer is Jharkhand PCC president, former MP and IPS officer. Views expressed are personal)

Writer: Ajoy Kumar

Courtesy:The Pioneer

The Railways deciding to enforce excess luggage rules stating that passengers have to pay up to six times the stipulated penalty if they caught travelling with overweight baggage.

In a controversial move the Indian Railways has decided to target passengers who carry far above and beyond their allotted luggage capacity. One of the reasons many passengers choose to use the Railways is because of the large amount of personal luggage they can carry. However, the Railway authorities have a point when they say that this move is to go after those individuals who abuse the system by carrying far more than they are allowed to. Incidentally, passengers on board trains can legally carry only between 35-70 kilograms depending on the class of travel. The Railways have also decided to act against those who carry large cartons and oversize luggage by stipulating that the maximum dimensions for a piece of luggage will be equivalent to a regular trunk.

There is a genuine concern by some passengers though, there sra espace hoarders, travellers whose luggage use up the entire underfloor space for luggage and whose oversize luggage often end up blocking corridors. This is not only an inconvenience to other passengers but also a safety hazard as well as symptomatic of the overall selfish behaviour of many Indians when they travel.

However, the railways cannot just stipulate this without making it easier for passengers to load their luggage in the luggage van, especially as they have limited space and many intermediate halts that Express trains make are usually far too short for luggage to be loaded and unloaded quickly.

And even though the luggage booking charges can be considered minimal, a charge of Rs 109 for booking 40kgs within 500 kilometers, it can be a huge hit to the many lower-income people who travel by train. It is one thing for airlines to charge for excess luggage, especially at these times of higher fuel costs where every additional kilogram on a plane can make a world of difference, on a train weighing thousands of tons, a few extra kilograms will make no difference to the operating costs of the train and this initiative by the railways will only generate needless controversy instead of much additional income. This follows a series of questionable decisions by the Indian Railways, including the move to differential fares in Rajdhani and Shatabdi trains, which ended up alienating passengers forcing some into the hands of India’s low-cost carriers. It might have made more sense for the Railways to begin a consumer education campaign on the risks of too much luggage before starting the fines. This might end up angering many travellers, particularly those who have no option but to travel by train.

Writer: Pioneer

Courtesy: The Pioneer

Narendra Modi delivered the keynote address at the Shangri-La Dialogue (SLD) in Singapore. He showed adherence to the rules that are mentioned in international forums. The keynote was the repetition of this principle without directly pointing a finger at china.

Shangri-La is usually associated with a place in the Himalaya immortalised by James Hilton in his 1933 novel, the Lost Horizon; a mystical valley where people live in harmony under the compassionate direction of a lamasery: In other words, a paradise on earth, a high-altitude utopian retreat, a permanently happy land.

The Shangri-La Dialogue (SLD) or Asia Security Summit annually organised by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), an independent think-tank based in London, is not about a perfect word, it deals with today’s chaotic real world. But the Track One inter-governmental security forum attended by heads of Government, defence ministers or military chiefs of the Asia-Pacific States, happens to be held in a hotel called Shangri-La in Singapore since 2002.

According to the organisers, “the Dialogue has (helped) built confidence and fostered practical security cooperation, by facilitating easy communication and fruitful contact among the region’s most important defence and security policymakers.” It is not an easy proposition, to ‘cultivate a sense of community’ in the region.

This year, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave the keynote address: “I am pleased to return to a region, known to India since ancient times as Swarnabhoomi, (the Land of Gold),” he told the delegates, adding: “For thousands of years, Indians have turned to the East. Not just to see the Sun rise, but also to pray for its light to spread over the entire world. The human-kind now looks to the Rising East, with the hope to see the promise that this 21st century beholds for the whole world, because the destiny of the world will be deeply influenced by the course of developments in the Indo-Pacific region.”

For decades, we were told that the pinnacle of diplomacy was ‘non-alignment’. Though it did not lead India anywhere, it became almost a religious dogma which often translated into an alignment with Moscow and a rejection of the West (except in November 1962, when Nehru ran to the United States for support).

Today, the situation is more healthy; Delhi, keeping India’s interests in mind, ‘aligns’ with the world’s major shareholders; it has perhaps been the greatest foreign policy’s achievement of the four-year rule of the Modi Sarkar.

US Defence Secretary James Mattis was not the last to praise the Prime Minister for his warning on the debts incurred by some countries; Modi had spoken about the dangers of accepting loans that were ‘too good to be true’.

Mattis told reporters: “(Modi) made a really good point there about the dangers of accepting loans that are ‘too good to be true’, and being forced into another agenda.”

The message was obviously targeting some of China’s practices through the Belt and Road Initiative; countries like Pakistan, Sri Lanka or Nepal, all India’s neighbours, are at the wrong end of these ‘loans’.

This year China sent a lower-than-usual delegation “in stark contrast to previous events, none of its members will give a keynote speech,” wrote The South China Morning Post before the event. When asked to explain, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying remained blissfully vague, it had ‘to do with work arrangements’.

But according to the he South China Morning Post’s sources: “The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) had scaled down its presence at the Shangri-La Dialogue to focus on domestic reforms.” The Chinese delegation to the 17th Shangri-La Dialogue was headed by Lt Gen He Lei, deputy head of the PLA’s Academy of Military Sciences.

But it is not that China was not listening, despite the remarks on ‘debts’, China was pleased with India, especially after Modi declared: “No other relationship of India has as many layers as our relations with China. Our trade is growing. I firmly believe that Asia and the world will have a better future if India and China work together with trust and confidence, keeping in mind each other’s interests.”

During a press conference, He Lei praised these words as a friendly and positive gesture; he also explained: “The mission of the Chinese delegation is to elaborate China’s foreign diplomacy and its defensive defense strategy, as well as to show the confident image of China’s military.”

The South China Sea issue was of course the ‘hot topic’ of the Dialogue, Here Hilton’s harmonious paradise was still far-away and China’s image has recently taken a beating.

However, the Chinese representative strongly defended his country’s interests and  affirmed: “The Chinese government and the Chinese people will never allow any person, any organization and any political party to separate any piece of Chinese territory from China at any time and in any form.” He also added that the PLA “has the determination, confidence and ability to safeguard the security of China’s sovereignty, unity and development interest.”

At the same time, China’s tone remained surprisingly soft vis-à-vis India. Zhao Xiaozhuo, a research fellow at the PLA Academy of Military Sciences, told The Global Times: “The India factor is what makes this year’s SLD different from previous ones,” perhaps because Beijing saw in Modi’s speech that, “the quasi-alliance between the US, Japan, India and Australia will not last long.”

Lt Gen He Lei, however, justified China’s deployment of ‘defensive’ facilities on the artificial islands as legitimate and necessary.

By now, China probably realised that its unilateral occupation of the South China Sea may not be accepted as a permanent fact by the rest of the Indo-Pacific community.

Take France and Britain, their defence ministers announced that their warships would sail through the South China Sea “to challenge Beijing’s expanding military presence in the disputed waters.”

Florence Parly, the French Armed Forces Minister told the forum that a French naval task group, together with British helicopters and ships, would soon be visiting Singapore “and then sail ‘into certain areas’ of the South China Sea.”

The French and British warships may cross into ‘territorial waters claimed by Beijing’; Parly even envisioned a potential encounter with China’s military: “At some point a stern voice intrudes into the transponder and tells us to sail away from supposedly ‘territorial waters’. But our commander then calmly replies that he will sail forth, because these, under international law, are indeed international waters.”

Mattis also spoke of the US plan to ramp up its freedom of navigation operations to counter Beijing’s militarisation in the region. The US does not accept Beijing’s contention that these territorial disputes are a matter between China and its Asian neighbours only.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi conluded by mentioning ‘Five S’, Samman (respect); Samvad (dialogue); Sahayog (cooperation), Shanti (peace), and Samriddhi (prosperity). He promised that “India will engage with the world in peace, with respect, through dialogue and absolute commitment to international law,” while adding: “We will work with others to keep our seas, space and airways free and open.”

But Delhi so far has managed to keep a balanced foreign policy; and India does not need to be non-aligned for that.

(The writer is an expert on India-China relations and an author)

Writer: Claude Arpi

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The Railways deciding to enforce excess luggage rules stating that passengers have to pay up to six times the stipulated penalty if they caught travelling with overweight baggage.

In a controversial move the Indian Railways has decided to target passengers who carry far above and beyond their allotted luggage capacity. One of the reasons many passengers choose to use the Railways is because of the large amount of personal luggage they can carry. However, the Railway authorities have a point when they say that this move is to go after those individuals who abuse the system by carrying far more than they are allowed to. Incidentally, passengers on board trains can legally carry only between 35-70 kilograms depending on the class of travel. The Railways have also decided to act against those who carry large cartons and oversize luggage by stipulating that the maximum dimensions for a piece of luggage will be equivalent to a regular trunk.

There is a genuine concern by some passengers though, there sra espace hoarders, travellers whose luggage use up the entire underfloor space for luggage and whose oversize luggage often end up blocking corridors. This is not only an inconvenience to other passengers but also a safety hazard as well as symptomatic of the overall selfish behaviour of many Indians when they travel.

However, the railways cannot just stipulate this without making it easier for passengers to load their luggage in the luggage van, especially as they have limited space and many intermediate halts that Express trains make are usually far too short for luggage to be loaded and unloaded quickly.

And even though the luggage booking charges can be considered minimal, a charge of Rs 109 for booking 40kgs within 500 kilometers, it can be a huge hit to the many lower-income people who travel by train. It is one thing for airlines to charge for excess luggage, especially at these times of higher fuel costs where every additional kilogram on a plane can make a world of difference, on a train weighing thousands of tons, a few extra kilograms will make no difference to the operating costs of the train and this initiative by the railways will only generate needless controversy instead of much additional income. This follows a series of questionable decisions by the Indian Railways, including the move to differential fares in Rajdhani and Shatabdi trains, which ended up alienating passengers forcing some into the hands of India’s low-cost carriers. It might have made more sense for the Railways to begin a consumer education campaign on the risks of too much luggage before starting the fines. This might end up angering many travellers, particularly those who have no option but to travel by train.

Writer: Pioneer

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The astute reader of international politics would have noted that in the UK the Labour Party (socialist)has been having a torrid time of late. In particular, accusation after accusation has surfaced, both from within the Party membership as well as from those on the outside. So, what say you all are these accusations related to? And the answer in a nutshell, it’s with regard to overt and covert racism against the Jewish community, and the turning of a blind eye to the anti-Semitism that appears to be rife in some corners of the Labour Party.

There has been a long-standing myth that the Labour Party in the UK is on the side of the ethnic minorities. I use the word, ‘myth’, because in my view and experience it has become apparent over the past several decades that maybe this perception that the Labour Party has enjoyed thus far might not be a true representation of its real under belly. So let’s start with the new leader of the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn. He became the unexpected leader of the Labour Party on 12th September 2015. I say unexpected since even his own MP’s did not want him, yet by a quirk of the voting methods used by the Labour Party, the vote bank politics of the Unions and the far-left dominated membership he was brought to power. The victory of Corbyn was almost like a signal to the far-left of the Party to do whatever they wanted to do. To the horror of the centrist Labour MP’s, Corbyn supporters saw this as a green signal and went on a political rampage. Within a short period of time a far-left group calling itself ‘Momentum’ started to take over the Labour Party narrative. It was almost as if the old Labour Party had been hijacked by the farleft, and the Unions who now seemed to have been given unchecked access to do whatever they wanted to do. In effect the Labour farleft seemed to be empowered toattack anyone who stood in their way, or in the way of their leader. The pent-upvenom over decades of frustration of the farleft was unleashed, and it seemed that their initial targets appeared to be their own MP’s and the centre of the Party membership.

The alarm bells were not just ringing, they were exploding with the news that the old guard of the Labour Party was finished and the new comrades of Corbyn were now in power. Labour MP’s in their last-ditch stand passed a vote of no confidence in Corbyn by 172 votes to 40 following the resignation of around two-thirds of Corbyn’s Shadow Cabinet. Now under any other democracy and for any other leader who had any honour and integrity, that would certainly mean walking away. However, Corbyn defied all logic in the knowledge that he had a majority of the membership votes, and the vote bank of the Unions that would keep him in place anyway. Labour MP’s were no longer in any position of influence. Labour had reached a bizarre position where the Parliamentary MP’s overwhelmingly rejected Jeremy Corbyn, yet the Party membership voted him in. The Labour Party as we knew it was finished.

So by now you must be asking the question, where and how does this antiSemitism issue arise? Well, in 2016 the Labour Party instigated what was called the Chakrabarti Inquiry. It was to investigate allegations of antisemitism and other forms of racism in the Labour Party. At that time comments made by two high-profile Labour figures, Naz Shah and Ken Livingstone had been deemed to have been anti-Semitic in nature were therefore to be investigated. On 30 June 2016 the findings were presented stating that although antisemitism and other types of racism were not endemic within Labour, there was an “occasionally toxic atmosphere”. The report was seen by most independent readers as a white wash. This became even more toxic when the British public discovered months later that the Chair of the same inquiry, Shami Chakrabartiwas suddenly made the Labour appointment to the House of Lords. Marie van der Syl, vice-president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, called it a whitewash for peerages scandal. The tone was set, increasingly it became clear to most people that something was not quite right. The Jewish community was outraged to the core. If this was not bad enough for the Labour Party, a cross-party Select Committee on antisemitism described the Chakrabarti Inquiry as “compromised”. It criticised the Labour party’s handling of anti-Semitism, concluding “the failure of the Labour Party consistently to deal with anti-Semitic incidents in recent years risks lending force to allegations that elements of the Labour movement are institutionally antiSemitic”.

Now to most sane people you would have thought that the writing was on the wall,and it was very clear. However, either the Leader of the Labour Party was deluded, compromised, part of the problem or just plain stupid to grasp the seriousness of the issues emerging. Whatever might the truth be, what was abundantly clear to most independent by-standers was that Labour was in trouble on the anti-Semitism issue and that it was not going to go away.

In early 2018 devastating news broke. It turns out that Jeremy Corbyn (and some other senior members of the Labour Party) were part of several Facebook groups. It also emerged that in some of the discussions taking place in these groups, there seemed to be antiSemitic views expressed openly. In what became a farce, Corbyn’s defence was that he did not know of these views being expressed in these groups, even though he was a member. In the end the leaders of British Jewry wrote an open letter to the Labour Party and Jeremy Corbyn stating, ‘enough is enough’. Never in the history of modern day politics has the Jewish community been so outraged, and so abused, that they felt compelled to write in the bluntest fashion that they had, had enough of the rhetoric and platitudes from the Labour leader.

I have of course touched on just the tip of this messy racist iceberg. The Labour Party has hitherto ridden a wave of support from various ethnic minority groups who have seen it as a champion for equality and human rights. However, and increasingly, people are beginning to question whether this is in fact a true representation of the Labour Party now, or whether it has managed to escape close scrutiny by offloadingsuch accusations onto the Conservative Party.

I have done a bit of digging myself and it seems that it is not just the Jewish community that is angry with the Labour Party.

I have come across many community leaders from the Hindu, Sikh and Jain communities who have also expressed serious concern and reservations about the Labour Party. When you delve a bit further you come across time and again, community leader after community leader telling you that they now perceive the Labour Party to be anti-India. In fact, they went on and stated that the impression they were getting was that Corbyn wasfundamentally anti-Modi with some suggesting that he was also anti-Hindu.

I am reminded of the first visit by PM Modi to the UK. It was under the stewardship of the then PM,David Cameron who welcomed the Indian PM with incredible hospitality. I remember the huge event that took place at Wembley Stadium when PM Cameron and PM Modi were on stage together as good friends. During that visit it was remarkable how the senior figures from the Labour Party were absent at most of events taking place. It was almost as if they had gone into hiding, trying their best to avoid coming into contact with PM Modi. The people noticed this open undermining of the Indian PM by the Labour Party. It was only towards the end of the visit that a hastily arranged meeting between the Labour leader and PM Modi took place – which I am told was a face-saving exercise for Corbyn. I am told, PM Modi gave him a few minutes only. A clear sign to the labour leadership that they cannot disrespect the biggest democracy on the planet and hope to get away with it so easily.

I asked many community leaders as to why the leader of the Labour Party had behaved in such a disgraceful fashion. Their answer was enlightening. As far as they were concerned the Labour Party was now a Party that was intertwined with the Pakistani community. Labour needed the Sunni and Kashmiri vote and could not do anything to alienate that community. In effect it seems the Labour Party had decided that harvesting the Sunni vote was more productive to them than trying to keep the votes of the other minorities. Again, one was left a bit perplexed. Surely such a strategy would be disastrous. And once again the very same leaders came back to me and said, not quite. It seems that the Labour Party had rightly concluded that the Hindu, Sikh and Jain vote was in the bag anyway, and given that these communities are not as well united and organised like the Pakistani community, they would not be able to damage their overall votes. There is a lot of truth in that view. History showed us there is still a sizeable Hindu, Sikh and Jain vote that always goes to the labour Party. This blind allegiance means that the Labour Party can get away with disrespecting their faith, their culture and their country of origin, knowing that they groups are too brainwashed to vote for anyone else. The Jewish vote for Labour on the other hand has gone down dramatically – they know how to show their displeasure.

When you investigate the matter further it transpires that most of the EDM (Early Day Motions in Parliament) that are negative to Israel and India tend to be led by Labour MP’s. No surprise there I suppose. In factthe Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn supported an EDM seeking a Visa ban for Shri Narendra Modi. Yes, you read that correctly.Even more startling, he wanted to ban PM Modi from the entering the UK. So readers in India, think about this seriously. You now have the leader of the Labour Party in the UK, who could potentially become the next PM of UK, who has openly sought to ban PM Modi from the UK. Add to that the fact that you still have some Indians in the UK who will blindly vote for Corbyn and Labour. I am informed that some of these very same Indians are also key advisors to PM Modi. Now how mad is that? It’s almost as if the Indian PM is being advised by, and is listening to, the very people who want to undermine him and India. Folks you cannot make this up if you tried. This is ground reality and I would hope that someone in PM Modi’s camp might see enlightenment and act accordingly, and quickly. If they want to know more, then I am always available to share my thoughts.

So let us move back to how the under belly of the Labour started to get exposed. The Jewish lobby is very powerful in the UK (as it is anywhere else in the world). I salute the Jewish community since they have learnt the lessons of history and have concluded, never again will they allow the racist from the far left,or the far right, to dictate the agenda and leave them in a precarious position. As soon as they raised their voice and took proactive action, we saw the fear in the Labour Party spreading. Jeremy Corbyn was forced to accept that his ideological positioning was not compatible with British society. Every media channel, including the proLabour media, ran the story to the end with remarkable editorials that more or less showed that Jeremy Corbyn was unfit to be a leader. We had endless apologies from him as well his senior MP’s in the Shadow Cabinet. Do I think the public believed a word of it? Simple answer, it seems most of the British public don’t believe a word he utters on this subject. It has become toxic to such an extent that even his own Jewish MP’s like Luciana Berger stated in Parliament that anti-Semitism within the party has become “commonplace, conspicuous and corrosive”.In May of this year, in many parts of the UK we had our Local Elections to elect Councillors and Councils. The Labour Party had been stating for months that this would be a total wipe out for the Conservative Party. The reality has now hit them hard. As the results were announced, the vast majority of Labour supporters were left devastated. Their prediction of winning everything in sight was way off the mark. In the end, the Conservative Party after 8 years in Government held on to most of the Councils and the wipe out that was predicted, never materialised. The reason, the anti-Semitism row took its toll. The Jewish community showed that not only can they affect and impact elections where they are in large numbers, but their reach goes much wider and affected results across the country.

India is the emerging giant. India under PM Modi has garnered huge respect around the world. However, it has yet to take people to task when India or Indians are undermined or disrespected. PM Modi needs all the support he can get from the nation. However with that support he, and his Government, must also deliver on some of the core issues emerging. India stands at the gateway of a glorious future. The dreams of Bharat varsh can be achieved where each and every Indian will be respected, valued and will find a place in the nation to fulfil their aspirations. This is not a time to blink, it’s time to stare your destiny in the eye and secure it.

In the words of Swami Vivekananda ji:“Arise awake and stop not until the goal is achieved.”

Twitter: @kk_OEG The writer is a seasoned businessman and a leading thought provoking writer from the UK. His command of detail and his ability to see issues and events years before they come to fruition is worthy of note. He has advised very senior politicians on a variety of issues. Being independent of thought, he does not compromise, nor does he bow to pressures to become politically correct.He understands the East, and he lives in the West. A unique grasp of perspectives that is often food for thoughts for all of us.

One of the most peaceful and pleasant cities of India, Shillong, has been caught up in sectarian violence. After three days of unrest, Shillong had a few peaceful hours on Sunday — only to be disturbed by violence that erupted again in defiance of the curfew in the evening.

India with her diverse cultures has always been a melting pot of multiple languages, traditions, foods and much else. This is what makes India by far and away the most unique nation-state on the planet; her natural diversity and the fact that for the most part tensions between communities have been kept to a minimum. But, unfortunately they often do tend to flare up. And in Shillong, the capital of Meghalaya, over the past few days the simmering tension between locals and Sikh immigrants from Punjab has boiled over into uncontrolled rioting catching a young and inexperienced Chief Minister unawares and on the back foot.

Shillong has for many years been one of India’s most serene State capitals although in recent years it also has faced the challenges of modern life, namely traffic and pollution. Yet, the recent violence is not something out of the ordinary. In the past, anti-immigrant violence has been directed at Bengalis and the current violence which might have begun over a parking dispute was one that had been simmering for a while as the local Khasi community blamed outsiders for ‘stealing their jobs’ and felt they were a cultural risk. Chief Minister Conrad Sangma, educated in New Delhi and very much a modern politician, has rapidly deployed State and Central forces to keep the riots in check after they spiralled in the initial hours. However, more needs to be done to keep matters in control.

But this is not a problem that will be restricted to Shillong in the future — as jobs become difficult to come by, the battle between locals who feel deprived of opportunities and immigrants from other States will become a huge issue across India. Immigrants, even when they are domestic migrants, tend to work harder and in a situation where jobs are difficult to come by will happily move to where the opportunities are. Locals will feel that immigrants will not only steal their jobs but also impose their cultural values. The Shiv Sena in the 1960s introduced this nativist ‘cultural’ protection’ philosophy as agitprop and local politicians across States as diverse as Goa, Karnataka and Jammu and Kashmir have exacerbated the issue over the past decade, often adding a communal tinge to it as well. These challenges will only intensify going forward and a single Chief Minister cannot deal with it. This issue needs a national solution, where we should all be reminded that we are Indians first and foremost. That said, the tendency of communities to ghettoise must be countered because these tend to make matters even worse. There is, however, no quick-fix. An integrationist philosophy coupled with an emphasis on a quantum leap in economic opportunities is the only solution.

Writer: Pioneer

Courtesy: The Pioneer

After observing the below par performance of the candidates from Bengal in the National Eligibility and Medical Entrance Test, Mamata Banerjee has decided to come out of the NEET scheme if gross errors are not rectified with immediate effect. But before that the ruling Trinamool congress is also planning to raise the issue in parliament along with other like-minded parties, sources said.

The Chief Minister said on Tuesday that “we are offended, the way the NEET exams were conducted. There are many flaws in it.” She added in the current scheme of things the regional aspirations would be deprived and advantages would go to ‘outsiders’ and not the bhoomi putras (people of the soil).

“The language is a big barrier. If things are conducted the way they were this time then local students and will not get chance and medical profession in States will be filled by people who do not belong to the regions concerned. Since language is a big issue in treating patients it is necessary that it is taken care of,” Banerjee said.

The Chief Minister who had earlier written to Union Minister Prakash Javadekar drawing his attention over inadequate availability of Bengali

question papers and also inappropriate translation of English papers in to Bengali, on Tuesday iterated “we found translations of various types. In many cases question papers had not come in adequate numbers so as to compel the students write their papers with English or Hindi versions which is as good as disallowing them the advantage of mother language.” Sources in the Government also said the ruling party was pondering over whether the State could come out of the NEET scheme of things. The party was also planning to raise the issue in a big way in Parliament and was in touch with other parties like DMK so that a coordinated effort can be made. “Regional aspirations cannot be disregarded and ignored in a manner they have done this time. We will want them to rectify the gross errors immediately,” sources in the Education Department said.

Meanwhile, in a new development the Chief Minister has said that her Government was mulling ways to tax outsiders to fund free medical treatment to the people of the State.

She said there were lakhs of people from other States and even abroad who come to Bengal seeking medical services from the Government hospitals. “On humanitarian grounds we cannot deny treatment to them but we have every right to charge them so that we can provide relief to our own citizens,” Banerjee said.

Writer: Saugar Sengupta

Courtesy: The Pioneer

It was a landslide for BJP in 2014, but 2019 won’t be the same

In approximately less than twelve months, Indian voters from Kanyakumari to Kashmir will go to the polls to select their next parliament. The country’s 2019 general election—like previous contests—will be the largest democratic exercise in world history. More than 870 million voters will be eligible to help determine which political party or alliance will form the government and, in turn, who will serve as prime minister.

Electoral outcomes are notoriously difficult to predict in India’s fragmented, hypercompetitive democracy. But one need not go out on a limb to declare that the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of Prime Minister Narendra Modi would be the front runner if the election were held today. Following the BJP’s decisive 2014 mandate, many analysts confidently proclaimed that Modi would remain in power for at least two, if not three, terms. Opinion polls reveal that Modi remains highly popular after four years in office, and the BJP has managed to methodically expand its national footprint in numerous state elections since 2014. The opposition, comprised of the once-dominant Indian National Congress and a plethora of regional parties, has struggled to counter the BJP onslaught.

Yet the election’s clear front-runner is far from invulnerable, despite anticipation of a BJP cakewalk in 2019. Although the intricacies of the upcoming race—such as the selection of candidates and the rhetoric of campaigns—remain unknown one year out, underlying structural conditions suggest far rockier terrain may lie ahead. In particular, four crucial objectives keep BJP strategists up at night: expanding beyond regional strongholds, recruiting new—and retaining old—coalition partners, withstanding a disappointing economic performance, and contending with fluctuations in voter mobilization. The party’s performance in the 2019 election will hinge largely on its ability to address these potential vulnerabilities and the opposition’s ability to exploit them.

2014 AND BEYOND

To understand the BJP’s position today, one must recall how unusual India’s 2014 election results were. Between 2004 and 2014, the Congress Party and its allies (known collectively as the United Progressive Alliance, or UPA) ran the central government in New Delhi. Although the UPA oversaw record economic growth during its first term, its second term was markedly less positive, as a slowing economy, doubts about its leadership, and an endless parade of corruption scandals badly dented the Congress-led alliance’s credibility.

In an era of fractured political mandates in New Delhi, the Modi-led BJP achieved what many analysts believed was unthinkable: it won a clear, singleparty majority in the lower house of the Indian parliament (the Lok Sabha) by capturing 282 of 543 seats (see figure 1). Its political allies—members of the
BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA)—netted another fifty-three seats. Although the BJP campaigned under the banner of “Mission 272” (a number that represents the threshold for a parliamentary majority), few Indians (even within the BJP itself) believed that the party was likely to meet, let alone surpass, this mark on its own.

The 2014 electoral outcome was historic. No party had obtained a clear majority of Lok Sabha seats on its own since 1984 when the Congress did so after the assassination of former prime minister Indira Gandhi. 2014 was the first time a non-Congress party had achieved an outright majority by itself without the need for a large, unwieldy coalition. Meanwhile, the Congress sank to its lowest total in history—a paltry forty-four seats. Prior to 2014, the fewest seats the Congress had won in a general election was 114 in 1999. In addition, the 2014 election saw record voter turnout: 66.4 percent of eligible voters (or roughly 554 million voters) cast ballots, a sharp uptick from the 58 percent recorded in the two previous elections.

With each passing year, the national reach of the BJP has grown while the reach of the Congress has shrunk. The BJP and its allies now run twenty-one of India’s twenty-nine states—home to over 70 percent of the Indian population (see figure 2). Prior to Modi’s election, the NDA controlled just eight states. The BJP’s gains have largely come at the expense of the Congress; whereas the latter ran thirteen states prior to the last general election, today it governs in just four. Furthermore, only two of these (Karnataka and Punjab) have substantial populations (with roughly 90 million residents between them).
The lion’s share of the credit for the BJP’s resurgence belongs to Modi, who remains the most popular politician in India. In May 2014, 36 percent of Indians surveyed named him as their preferred candidate for prime minister, compared to just 14 percent for Congress President Rahul Gandhi. Although Modi’s rating might sound low from a comparative perspective, it is remarkably high for India’s fragmented political system in which 464 parties contested the 2014 general election. While Gandhi’s rating had risen to 20 percent by January 2018, Modi’s popularity has remained extremely stable throughout his four years in office (hovering around 37 percent). Historically, Gandhi’s rating has proven erratic, in part due to his twin struggles with consistency and effectiveness.

REIMAGINING THE MAP

Pulling off an encore performance of the BJP’s sweeping 2014 victory will be a tall order; to compensate for potential losses in its core areas, the party must venture into new territory. In 2014, the BJP virtually swept areas where it traditionally enjoys strong support in northern and western India (see figure 3). Just eight states—Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh—accounted for over 75 percent of the BJP’s tally in parliament. Collectively, these states account for 273 seats, of which the BJP won 216 (nearly 80 percent).

Running the table in two consecutive elections will be an uphill battle. Indian voters are legendary for their tendency to harbor anti-incumbency sentiments; research suggests that individual members of parliament (MPs) are just as likely to get thrown out of office at the end of their term as to get voted back in. There are also statelevel anti-incumbency effects that have negative spillovers on national politics. Parliamentary candidates representing a given state’s ruling party enjoy an electoral advantage in national elections, but only when national elections are held early in the state government’s term. Once this honeymoon period is over, holding power in India’s states becomes a liability in general elections. This poses a problem for the BJP, which serves as the ruling party in all eight of these core states; in five of them, its governments are nearing the ends of their terms.

Because Modi and BJP President Amit Shah—a longtime Modi aide and a savvy campaign strategist—know engineering another sweep of these eight core states will be difficult, they have placed great importance on expanding the BJP’s footprint into parts of the country where it traditionally has been weak. Hence, the BJP’s painstaking devotion to breaking into India’s northeast—long considered to be a bastion of the Congress and smaller regional parties. The northeast is often seen as inconsequential to the overall electoral picture given that it accounts for just 3.7 percent of India’s population. Yet the region boasts twenty-five parliamentary seats, a tempting prize for a party that covets new territory to compensate for losses likely to be sustained elsewhere. Thanks to a series of recent state-level victories, the BJP now sits in government in seven of these eight states and is building up organizational and alliance networks across the region; as a relatively new player in northeastern India, the BJP is less likely to fall prey to Indian voters’ antipathy for incumbents there than in the party’s traditional strongholds. Whereas the Congress retains the capacity to put up a good fight in the Hindi heartland, its stature in the northeast has rapidly diminished.

Having established a foothold in northeastern India, the BJP now aims to increase its strength along India’s eastern seaboard in major states such as Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, and West Bengal. In a fifth state, Andhra Pradesh, the BJP has worked primarily through a key alliance partner—the Telugu Desam Party (TDP). The four aforementioned states serve as a sort of firewall the BJP has struggled to penetrate in national elections. All told, these five states collectively account for 144 seats in the parliament. Each is home to one (or more) powerful parties with strong ties to linguistic, regional, and cultural identities the BJP currently lacks.

However, this firewall may be fracturing. In West Bengal, the BJP trails the ruling Trinamool Congress Party in terms of statewide appeal. But it views the demise of the two principal opposition forces—the Left (a coalition of left-leaning parties) and the Congress— as providing a crucial opening for it to emerge as the second-largest party. The ruling Biju Janata Dal of Odisha won twenty of twenty-one parliamentary seats in 2014, ceding just one to the BJP. But the latter won one-quarter of the vote and has subsequently performed well in municipal elections. In Tamil Nadu, the BJP is a bit player on its own but sees the potential to make inroads through alliances. Fissures within the state’s ruling party, the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, have given the BJP hope that the party system might be ripe for realignment.

COALITION DYNAMICS

Sustaining previous hard-won gains and breaking new ground in pockets of the country outside BJP strongholds, however, will require partners. On this score, the BJP’s prognosis is mixed.

On the one hand, thanks to the widespread sense that the BJP has the wind at its back, the party has become the central pole around which politics in India revolves. This distinguished position once belonged to the Congress, but its recent electoral stumbles and the BJP’s abundant successes have decisively changed the equation. In three recent state elections—in Goa, Manipur, and Meghalaya—the BJP failed to emerge as the single largest party. Nonetheless, thanks to its allure as an alliance partner, the BJP formed governments in all three states by winning over several smaller parties who decided to join a party gaining momentum rather than one appearing to lose it. Across states, the BJP, not the Congress, seems to be the default governing party.

Yet recent events suggest that the BJP’s electoral coalition is showing signs of strain. Existing BJP allies are voicing concerns about the party’s methods, raising the possibility that its electoral coalition could fracture. Two of the BJP’s biggest allies, the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra and the TDP in Andhra Pradesh, have recently put the BJP on notice that they are unhappy with its “arrogant” leadership style. The Shiv Sena announced in January 2018 that it would contest the 2019 elections alone, rather than with the BJP. In March, the TDP pulled its ministers
from the central cabinet in New Delhi to express disappointment with the Modi government’s failure to help Andhra Pradesh tap additional central government funds. When the BJP refused to budge, the TDP announced its decision to formally exit the alliance. These ruptures, while not fatal or irreversible, potentially complicate the BJP’s electoral arithmetic in 2019. If the BJP is successfully tarred as anti-Andhra, it would be difficult for the party to notch a pre-poll alliance with any of the major regional parties there, increasing the
likelihood that a sizeable chunk of the state’s twenty-five seats would be out of the BJP’s reach. In Maharashtra, provided the opposition coalition remains intact, the split with the Shiv Sena could create a three-way race.

Luckily for the BJP, the opposition remains in disarray. The Congress has been slow to rectify the organizational and leadership deficiencies laid bare in 2014. As one senior party leader has mused, the Congress has faced electoral crises before, but what it faces today is an existential crisis. While it will likely gain seats in 2019, one Congress leader privately admitted that a triple-digit figure would be a stretch at present. Left parties have seen a precipitous decline nearly everywhere save for the state of Kerala, its last remaining stronghold. The upstart Aam Aadmi Party, which came to power in the Delhi state assembly by way of an assertive, agitational brand of politics, has struggled to extend its reach beyond the national capital. Moreover, parties opposed to the BJP have failed to coordinate and pool their votes so as to keep the BJP out of power.

There have been two notable exceptions where opposition parties have set aside their differences and forged a degree of bonhomie. The first was the 2015 state election in Bihar, where a socalled grand alliance of opposition parties joined hands to keep the BJP from winning power. The opposition alliance won a resounding victory, but this short-lived marriage of convenience ultimately ended when one party defected. More recently, in March 2018, two rival regional parties in Uttar Pradesh buried their long-standing differences to jointly defeat the BJP in a special by-election. Regional players could give the BJP a run for its money in their respective states, but doing so will require them to work cooperatively—something that does not come naturally to rivals who bitterly jostle for political space. The effects of the BJP’s own alliance drama will be mitigated if the opposition proves unable or unwilling to do business together in 2019.

ECONOMIC ANXIETY

But it is not only allies the BJP must worry about retaining; many voters who were swayed by Modi’s promise to usher in acche din (good times) by reenergizing the Indian economy have also grown restive. In 2014, India was plagued by slumping growth, ballooning deficits, stalled investments, and soaring inflation—offering the BJP untold opportunities to critique the Congress Party’s mismanagement of bread-andbutter issues. Although invocations of Hindu majoritarianism also populated the BJP’s entreaties, it was the BJP’s insistence that it would rectify the declining economy that resonated across the country. Yet as economic progress under Modi has fallen short of expectations, anxieties about the lack of job creation have led to massive popular protests in state after state. While the intensity and scope of voter disaffection with India’s economy is not certain, there are signs that disquiet is rising among rural voters who decisively backed the BJP four years ago. Given that farmers account for roughly half of India’s labor force, rural economic woes raise alarm bells for every incumbent politician.

BJP strategists once believed that economic revival would be the hallmark of the 2019 campaign. Unfortunately for them, the economy has not experienced a uniform revival. Growth, while high by international standards, remains well below the country’s potential. A failure to deal quickly with a systemic banking crisis has bogged down the domestic investment cycle. Inflation, which has fallen from the double-digit levels of the tenure of the Congress, remains a risk in an election year when the pressure to spend will be elevated. Furthermore, the Modi government’s decisions to abruptly remove high-value currency notes from circulation and enact the sweeping Goods and Services Tax reform have hurt short-term growth, irrespective of their longer-term merits. More importantly, for the average Indian, job growth has been anemic. According to the Reserve Bank of India, total employment actually shrank between 2014 and 2016. While it appears that nonfarm jobs grew over this period, farming jobs declined—perhaps as a result of successive droughts. The BJP is betting that its flagship welfare schemes might inoculate it against its patchy economic record. Criticized for having cozy links to corporate capital, Modi’s administration has doggedly tried to burnish its propoor credentials by doubling down on major welfare schemes—such as granting every household a bank account, initiating free cooking gas connections to families below the poverty line, and ensuring universal affordable housing.

These efforts notwithstanding, economic travails are especially apparent in rural India. Although once the bailiwick of the Congress, many rural voters in 2014 switched their allegiance to the BJP—a party that has historically performed better with city-dwellers. The rural shift toward the BJP could easily swing back to the Congress; for instance, available data suggests that support for the BJP alliance among farmers has declined over the past year. Indeed, recent distress in the farming sector is likely sending chills down the spines of BJP leaders. Despite Modi’s promises to double agrarian incomes by 2022, agriculture remains in a state of disrepair. While the causes of this distress are largely structural, proximate factors such as the decline in the prices of several agricultural commodities and shortfalls in farm production have stimulated outrage among many rural Indians.

A clear warning shot was fired in December 2017 during elections in Gujarat, a longtime BJP bastion. Although it retained its majority in the state assembly, the BJP encountered serious rural opposition—especially in the key region of Saurashtra—where the Congress prevailed by capitalizing on caste politics and the waning fortunes of farmers. In March 2018, as many as 50,000 farmers in Maharashtra descended on the state capital of Mumbai to demand the BJP state government move swiftly to aid them. How widespread this disaffection has spread is unclear. All eyes will be on upcoming state elections in Karnataka (in May 2018) and Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan (in December 2018) to discern whether this alleged drop-off in rural locales is sustained.

VOTER MOBILIZATION

A final concern for the BJP in 2019 is voter mobilization. In 2014, the party successfully channeled popular disaffection with the incumbent Congress Party into record voter turnout (66.4 percent). Voter turnout had previously peaked at 64 percent in 1984 and fell to between 56 and 62 percent in subsequent election cycles. As Neelanjan Sircar has pointed out, there was a strong association between the growth in voter turnout and the improved fortunes of the BJP in the 2014 election. A key source of strength came from young voters. Research has demonstrated that states with the largest increases in the share of young, first-time voters in
2014 also experienced the biggest gains in BJP vote share. With the novelty of Modi and BJP rule in New Delhi wearing thin, there is a risk that voter turnout will return to ordinary levels, reducing the BJP’s enthusiasm advantage.

One key demographic the BJP believes it can energize in 2019 is women. Although they do not vote as a bloc per se, the party believes several of its welfare schemes have special resonance with women and can influence their votes. This is significant because Indian females are voting in greater numbers than ever before. In 2014, women voted at higher rates than men in sixteen of India’s thirty-five states and union territories. At the state level, female turnout now regularly surpasses male turnout.

Looking ahead, the BJP’s predicament is how to mobilize voters as an incumbent party. One possibility is that the party will choose to invoke the Hindu nationalist card more expressly and more intensively to rile up its base. Such a move toward polarization would become even more likely if the opposition successfully bands together to forge a common anti-BJP front. Yet such a risky strategy could turn off as many (or more) voters as it galvanizes.

CONCLUSION

One year in advance, many details of the 2019 race remain unknown, but its structural drivers are quickly coming into view. Modi and Shah are wasting no time in recalibrating their approach to mitigate the BJP’s unexpected challenges. For instance, the government’s most recent budget was packed with pro-poor rhetoric and numerous sops meant to allay rural anger. As existing allies are growing wary with the BJP’s modus operandi, the party’s high command has stepped up its outreach to smooth frayed relations. And, concerned about waning voter enthusiasm, Modi has directed the party’s elected representatives to redouble efforts to connect with constituents. In one instance, Modi is reported to have warned sitting BJP MPs that they must amass at least 300,000 followers on social media or risk losing their party tickets. The opposition is making adjustments as well. Gandhi and the once-dithering Congress appears more focused and consistent. The opposition, at least rhetorically, is embracing the need to forge a common anti-BJP front in 2019. Twelve months is an eternity in politics, but one thing has become evident: once thought to be a cakewalk for the BJP, the 2019 election is turning into a contest.

Courtesy Carnegie Foundation: The author is grateful to Matthew Lillehaugen for excellent research and editorial assistance and Ryan DeVries for thoughtful edits.

Winning the trust vote naturally involved dodgy moves. Yet, as Indira Gandhi often demonstrated, the electorate always nurtures a grudging respect for those who can beat the odds, ethics being no bar in war. If the battle, for the BJP, was all about defeating the Congress — and, by implication, the Old Establishment that is putting up a spirited resistance to Modi’s dominance of Indian politics — the challenge was always worth accepting.

Last Saturday, in a terrible anti-climax, the BJP leader B S Yeddyurappa opted out of the floor test and in effect handed over the mantle of chief ministership to the leader of the third party in the Karnataka Assembly. Yeddyurappa may well live to fight another day but, for the moment, H D Kumaraswamy is the new Chief Minister of Karnataka, courtesy the Congress. In normal circumstances, this post-election battle of numbers would have been viewed as yet another disagreeable muddle, the likes of which India has experienced on innumerable occasions. It would have been interesting but hardly worth the carpet bombing coverage the country has witnessed on the news channels.

The difference was on two counts. First, the Karnataka battle was transformed into a facet of national politics. There was a positioning game under way for the 2019 general election. The BJP was intent on demonstrating that its march through the whole of India is unstoppable. Having established a firm foothold in Assam and the rest of North-east India, an area where the saffron flag was a novelty in the past, the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah army was now intent on establishing its hold in southern India, Karnataka being the gateway. The Opposition, on the other hand, was anxious on two counts. First, the post-election combination of the third party and the second party is a possible template for what they hope will happen after 2019 — a grand combination of all anti-BJP forces, united by a common concern for secularism. Secondly, for the beleaguered Congress, the loss of Karnataka was too major a blow to countenance. Rather than risk being reduced to what Modi mocked as Punjab-Puducherry-Parivar and being resource-starved for 2019, the Congress would rather get a toehold at any cost, even if it involved participating in — what may turn out to be — an ATM government.

Now that the BJP failed to muster the numbers, there are bound to be questions raised. Should the party have staked a claim to form the government, knowing fully well that the other side had more MLAs? Should it not have taken the high moral ground and opted to sit in opposition, knowing fully well that the inverted pyramid model of government formation tends to be woefully short-lived? On the other hand, why concede the battle to the enemy without at least a fight?

These questions are not unique. In 1996, Atal Bihari vajpayee, as leader of the single largest party, was invited by the President to form a government. He accepted, despite knowing that he lacked the numbers. For a few days the BJP tried — rather amateurishly, I may add — to persuade other non-Congress parties to support Vajpayee. When it was clear it was a hopeless project, the party extracted full mileage through a dramatic resignation speech of Vajpayee, a speech that elevated his stature and was a factor in the BJP coming to power in 1998.

It is doubtful that Yeddyurappa’s speech had the same effect as vajpayee’s oratory. He will no doubt be seen as a martyr by his core Lingayat controversy. But overall, the projection will be that Modi and Shah were thwarted by a determined ‘secular’ opposition. The BJP’s defeat will become an occasion for ‘secular’ triumphalism, just as his victory would have generated the same elation among the Modi supporters. How last Saturday’s outcome of the confidence vote will influence political thinking in Karnataka in the next year will depend on two factors. First, how the new government will be able to cope with a fragile majority will set the tone. Secondly, much will depend on whether the BJP’s argument that it sought to abide by the spirit of the Assembly election mandate is more persuasive than the claim that the BJP has to be stopped from winning another state at all cost.

From the BJP’s perspective which option — being in government or opposition —was preferable? There are no clear cut answers. Winning the trust vote naturally involved dodgy moves. Yet, as Indira Gandhi often demonstrated, the electorate always nurtures a grudging respect for those who can beat the odds, ethics being no bar in war. If the battle, for the BJP, was all about defeating the Congress — and, by implication, the Old Establishment that is putting up a spirited resistance to Modi’s dominance of Indian politics — the challenge was always worth accepting. The real issue is how the BJP can put the Congress in the doghouse. That is where political communication becomes all-important. In the event the JD(S)-led government is established clumsily, the BJP will have to go to town with the message that the Congress is brazen, shameless and insatiably power hungry; that it has learnt absolutely nothing from the electoral drubbing it received; and that it is shameless enough to re-appoint former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah as Legislature Party leader. Just as much as the BJP needs to show how the spirit of the mandate for change was violated, it will have to direct its artillery fire against the Congress. The importance of the Congress lies not merely in its brand name but the fact that the party is still the rallying point for a very powerful section of the Old Establishment that wants Modi out as soon as possible. Weaken the Congress and the rest is a relative pushover.

There is little opprobrium likely to be attached to Kumaraswamy for settling for the best bargain. The JD(S) set about to win the day despite coming third and it has done so. There is little point targeting him, just as there was little point assaulting Madhu Koda, the one-man brigade who ended up as Chief Minister. The guilty party, as always, was the Congress. The Karnataka experience shows that nothing has changed. Power is the glue that keeps the Congress alive. Take it away and, hopefully, the Ganga and Cauvery will be cleaned.

(Swapan Dasgupta: Writer is a senior journalist and Member of Parliament, being a presidential nominee to the Rajya Sabha)