The Indian election results have been pouring in, with the Congress/UPA government set to return to power for another five years. Here is the New York Times’ story; apparently, this is the first time since Nehru that an Indian political party has served out the full five years, and then been reelected to power.
I wanted to give readers a chance to share information and suggest sites that are gathering results in various parts of the country. I am especially curious to see what happens with Shashi Tharoor in Trivandrum (I blogged about him a few weeks ago), and of course the political landscape as a whole. As of 1:00 am EDT, the UPA is up over the NDA/BJP around 220-150 [update: the final number for the UPA will be something more like 259]. The UPA is going to stay in, and even consolidate its power — which means, greater independence from the Left. Manmohan Singh is likely to remain Prime Minister for awhile, and perhaps it’s going to be curtains for L.K. Advani’s Prime Ministerial aspirations.
I was watching IBN live here.
The NDTV VoteMap is pretty nice, though it would be better if there were a way to see who held a given state or a given district earlier.
On Twitter, the tag seems to be #indiavotes09. The stream is moving very quickly. There is something called Tweetgrid, which lets you see feeds for six Twitter keywords at once.
Shashi Tharoor has his own Twitter feed: ShashiTharoor. As of now, he is up by 30,000 votes, with more than half of the votes counted.
The BBC’s live results are pretty good. As of this writing, Varun Gandhi (the communal one, from Sanjay’s wing of the family) is leading, and Mayawati’s BSP is losing. In Kerala, the left is likely to decline dramatically from 2004. The Communists are in decline in West Bengal too, presumably in payback for their handling of Nandigram. Lalu Prasad Yadav, who had earlier decided to pull support from Congress, is now admitting it was a mistake, as his RJD party ended up losing seats.
Via Ultrabrown, Bloomberg has a story, with Congress leaders using “Jai Ho” as a victory chant. Also via Ultrabrown, Mayawati is going to lock up victorious BSP candidates, to prevent them from being picked off by other parties. It’s a typical Mayawati thing to do, and presumably illegal — though that’s never stopped her before.
Please suggest any sites with data and analysis that you would recommend.
It is a baldfaced lie. You said Teesta was convicted of perjury by the SC – the comment is right there. Which is a complete lie, especially when the exact opposite happened and she was exonerated once by the SC of the allegations of coaching – the allegation you repeat here, despite being told otherwise, as is your track record on other issues, and those who were trying to slander here were slammed by the SC the second time. And the claim of the SIT report has been shot to bits – the blog link I pointed to is an article by Siddharta Vaidyanathan, and the wiki link points to other newspaper articles, so again, a lie about the evidence in the hope that it will not be rebutted.
You are right, my mistake. Given that the credibility of your commentary has been rendered essentially non-existent except among your fellow-travelers, as multiple of your lies have been rebutted several times by me and other commenters, any further engagement with you is unnecessary. Thank you for reminding me.
I didn’t say she was convicted, the comment is right there. I said she was” found” by the Supreme Court. The SIT reports to the Supreme court. Then I said, “why hasn’t she been prosecuted?”. How can someone be convicted when she hasn’t been prosecuted? Aww, poor Abhishek, should have gone to Madam to help you come up with an actual “Gotcha moment”. Too bad, better luck next time
So, sorry you haven’t rebutted anything, only tried to shout me down with unsupported assertions.
Consider you have spent all your time trying to explain how Rao had nothing to do with the reforms and how Sonia Gandhi is a good thing for India, I don’t think you have credibility with anyone, period…
But please, continue to make assertions without any links (unless it’s from wikipedia)…
Wry says: I said she was” found” by the Supreme Court.
What he said was:
People can make their judgment of what this statement means, and what being “found to have committed perjury by the SC” should be interpreted as.
Especially when the SC explicitly said that there was no merit in the coaching allegation and threw it out, as well as condemned the leaking of the SIT report as a breach of trust. Not to mention the fact that there has been lot of credible reporting discrediting the SIT report, which wasn’t even that, but likely to have been something from the Gujarat government as multiple independent observers have said, and the credibility of the ToI reporter has been called in question by many many people. The assertions are all there with multiple links by multiple reporters for those who choose to follow the links I provided in my earlier comment.
I rebutted certain laughable claims that MMS was not responsible for the reforms, and the notion that PVNR was exclusively responsible.
Since I never said any such thing, you have dug an even deeper hole for yourself on the credibility front.
Dude, you really should just take your own advice, and stop posting
No you see, it just depends on your interpretation of the “good thing”. Since you kept on trying to defend Sonia Gandhi by comparing here to Barack Obama, “people can make their judgement of what your statements meant”. Just like in your dictionary “found” means “convicted. That’s why you hacked off the rest of my comment when you reposted to cover up your mistake. When here is the full comment:
How on earth can you possibly interpret “found” to mean “convicted” when I clearly wrote “why hasn’t the media called for her prosecution?”. Really dude, just sad. So either you think people can be convicted before being prosecuted (I hope you don’t plan on becoming a lawyer, beta) or you were just trying to conveniently mangle the facts to support your position (then I really don’t hope you plan on becoming a lawyer, beta)…Either way, you so very obviously caught yourself in a lie…
Kay, the media isn’t just limited to TV. It includes independent newspapers and radio stations–of which there were plenty in 1984. I’m sorry, but the explanation doesn’t pass muster when Rajiv Gandhi said this in response to cries about the Congress massacre of Sikhs: ” “When a big tree falls, the earth trembles!”. Whether TV, newspaper, or radio, (or now internet blogs), the media has a responsibility to be independent in any age.
For the rest of you who’ve unfortunately had to read the exchange about Teeta Setalvad:
Now that Abhishek has caught himself in his own lie and is crying himself to sleep, here are a few links rebutting what he said on the Supreme Court’s SIT Report:
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/sit-report-on-teesta/450171/1 http://pragati.nationalinterest.in/2009/05/tampering-with-evidence/ http://www.newstodaynet.com/col.php?section=20&catid=33&id=16664
Here is a highlight:
“The criminal justice system rests on witnesses telling the truth and it is for this reason that courts take a dim view of perjury. The allegations against Ms Setalvad would be classified as perjury by even its most liberal definition. The court’s magnanimous gesture of not ordering a full investigation against Ms Setalvad is misplaced. “
[For those who are unfamiliar with the issue, the Supreme Court of India’s SIT (Special Investigation Team) investigated the Gujarat Riots. The SIT report’s finding were leaked. The blog Abhishek posted tried to insinuate that the Gujarat Govt planted the story. The report has not yet been released to the public, including Abhishek’s blogger, so I guess “shot to bits” means “I am engaging in verbal acrobatics to cover up my mistake since my blogger doesn’t actually have access to the report” (see below)]
Here is what Dhananjay Mahapatra, The TOI reporter who broke the story wrote in response to questions about his earlier story
“My report was based on the SIT report and not any document circulated by the Gujarat government, as suggested by CJP. Whether any section of the media has the report or not is irrelevant as TOI has access to the report. “
Abhishek’s buddy Siddharth Varadarajan,(And btw, Abhishek, for someone arguing credibility, it’s a pity that in your haste you didn’t take the time to notice that the blogger is Siddharth Varadarajan, not “Vaidyanathan”) calls that into question by asking (on his blog) why there haven’t been further disclosures and continues to insinuate that it was the Gujarat Govt that made it up. Dhananjay Mohapatra, as you can see, argued otherwise.
So, in yet another tragedy, poor Abhishek was caught in another lie here too. “Blown to bits” means rebuttal by insinuation conducted by a blogger, whose name he did not actually know. And the Teesta allegations weren’t blown to bits, but rather Abhishek’s credibility was…again. We wish him well as he attempts to recuperate over the next few weeks and look forward to seeing him back in action when the time is right…
At last the final results have come out and UPA is about to form the government. Even thought I am very disappointed with the verdict I respect it. There are two important points which I should bring to the notice of SM. 1. Of all the verdicts in national and state political parties I love how the commies are kicked out. They have lost more credibility than any other political party. This might not shatter communism at once in India but it is the start of their end. I feel that they should be totally wiped out of this country. I am happy that things are going on the right way regarding commies. 2. The other thing which I felt deeply regretful is how the second largest nationalist party BJP is treated by its own citizens. It disserves more seats. I also felt that NDA should come to power and kick the dynasty politics out of this country. But they didn’t plan well and they failed miserably. They always focused on NDA and totally forgot what BJP is. I have to undergo this pain for the coming 5 years. I don’t know where this country is going. This journey is going to be really tough. I pray to god to give Peace of Mind for all those people who supported Dharma. Guys and girls, this is temporary and we have bared it before.
Satya: Since you seem to have read only half of what I wrote, here it is again: Yes. We did not have a sufficiently independent media in 1984. We did have one in 2002. No one who has lived in India equates those two time periods. That does not make the current media biased. That does not change who Narendra Modi is. If the media in 1984 did not call a spade a spade, it does not mean the media in 2002 shouldn’t either.
Your argument for you claim that the media today is biased and wrongly portrayed the BJP boils down to saying that the media was biased in 1984. I assume you are smart enough to realize the logical fallacy in that. Your real argument seems to be: “yes the BJP is a bunch of communal hate mongers. So what? At least they are on my side. The congress is also communal and they are on the other side.” Thankfully for India, Hindus who live in India largely do not think so.
BTW, have you ever lived in India for any length of time?
Peace.
We did not have mass electronic media in 1984, but there was print media. I am not suggesting print media went soft on the 1984 riots (they may well have been, I just don’t know), but they were quickly forgotten once Khalistani terrorism became the focal point. I also question the ‘independent’ part – proliferation of media organisations does not mean there is good journalism. In fact, there is virtually no investigative journalism to speak of today, particularly when it comes to electronic media.
I think the word is “borne.” “Bared” suggests we stripped it naked and while I can bear rule by the UPA, I am not sure I could bear the sight of baring them.
Kush, do you just believe that IMF did not impose conditions, or do you have insights on this? I don’t claim to know, but the fact that India opened up for foreign investment cannot just be a coincidence. It may not have been as bad as Latin America or South East Asia, but I would be surprised if indeed the IMF just wanted India to ‘reform itself’. Reform was highly necessary for domestic business, but small businesses still face the same issues.
Everyone seems to be in agreement about the communists and I detest their politics as well, but to dismiss all of their ’causes’ would be a mistake. On foreign investment into retail, for instance, there needs to be some caution (may not be a huge issue, if the performance of home grown retailers, especially in the groceries sector, is an indication).
I think you’re missing the point. What it does is exposes the politically motivated mau-mauing for what it is. If you want to call him a spade fine. But you can’t use that to justify your use of the other tool over there when that too is a spade.
YogaFire wrote: If you want to call him a spade fine. But you can’t use that to justify your use of the other tool over there when that too is a spade.
No, it isn’t. Tytler is yesterday’s news. Modi thinks he’s the BJP future.
Kush, do you just believe that IMF did not impose conditions, or do you have insights on this? I don’t claim to know, but the fact that India opened up for foreign investment cannot just be a coincidence. It may not have been as bad as Latin America or South East Asia, but I would be surprised if indeed the IMF just wanted India to ‘reform itself’. Reform was highly necessary for domestic business, but small businesses still face the same issues.
Just yesterday, I read a few musings by then IMF chief. His big claim is that he did not impose his (IMF) conditions on India, but asked them to make changes that were “theirs” for the bailout money.
Nobody is saying IMF was going to give money in 1991 without some serious fundamental shift in Indian economic policy at that time. It is also possible he is now soft peddling IMF conditions that were perhaps put forth at that time.
We did not have mass electronic media in 1984, but there was print media. I am not suggesting print media went soft on the 1984 riots (they may well have been, I just don’t know), but they were quickly forgotten once Khalistani terrorism became the focal point.
In 1984 The Delhi unit (headed by Bhagat & Tytler) of the Congress party organised mass-murder. I have been in riots before (Hyderabad: Telangana & Hindu-Muslim) and this was no riot. The print media did go soft on the Congress Party. The only organisation that brought out a report quickly and kept pushing the fact that this was organised murder was the PUCL (much like the ACLU here). A shrewd Congress Party dissolved parliament, held elections and consolidated power due to the massive sympathy wave for Indira Gandhi’s death. In fact, Bhagat was rewarded with the Information & Broadcasting ministership. Newspaper owners toed the line. The PUCL used to hand out the report (little black book) at major intersections in all the major cities. In fact, the Congress spun any discussion on the 1984 murders as supporting Sikh separatism.
I strongly felt at the time that the time was ripe for Jan Sangh/BJS/BJP to go beyond the Hindutva platform and take on the cause of Sikh mass-murder by the Congress. This way they could atone for the Congress coming back to power in 1980 when Vajpayee & Advani withdrew their support for the Janta party. This was a way to go national and beyond religion but, they chose to become more radical and insular.
In fact, the Congress spun any discussion on the 1984 murders as supporting Sikh separatism.
Much like any discussion of Guantanamo, torture, Cheney’s motivation is spun by a lot of Republicans and talk-show folks as support for the terrorists from 9/11.
Yaar, these are trivial points. Who did the Chinese invite to the Olympics? Sonia Gandhi or the Indian PM Manmohan?? Since they invited Sonia Gandhi, obviously she is must be a Indian. Yeah, I know she has surrounded herself with a Christian coterie intent on converting the heathens, but that’s not important. just look at the Christian record in heathen societies. They’re saving souls and spreading love.
Kush, Agree with you there. India was no “emerging power” in 1990. It was no emerging-anything and was a push-over state. IMF conditions are exactly what forced the government to take the action on economic front.
Oh yeah, I can just feel the love.
Yeah, I know she has surrounded herself with a Christian coterie intent on converting the heathens, but that’s not important. just look at the Christian record in heathen societies. They’re saving souls and spreading love.
Why do Hindus who luv India and dharma abandon India and choose to live in Christian societies? Why is difficult for them to acknowledge that money is more important than their professed love of their culture?
Because the second largest party in India is entirely supported by NRIs. Clearly.
It couldn’t possibly be that a blog geared towards Indo-Americans might draw a lot of Indo-Americans no?
Dear tired, Chill out, relax, have a rooh afza. Then go through this short and a very incomplete list of some Indians who spent many years of their lives abroad, learning, analysing and refining their thoughts. The leaders I mention differ widely in their political leanings, but were nationalists nevertheless.
You can be a deracinated wannabe living in your own country, and you can discover the beauty of your civilisation living in a foreign country. There are many motives for people who choose to live/work/study abroad. Thinking of money as the sole motive actually says something about you. 1 2. 3 4. 5 6 7 8
Oops The actual #2
Which “christian societies” do you speak of? If you include the USA in that, you would be wrong. Many different religions are thriving in the USA. Atheists are also thriving here.
The United States is NOT a “christian theocracy” at all.
Even the holiday called “christmas” is stripped of its religious meaning in the mainstream and is all about consumerism.
The overarching ethos of American mainstream is secular consumerism. This makes it a great place to practice whatever religion you choose because no other religion will be forced on you or “in your face”.
It also opens up a great free-market for all religions to tout their products/ideals. Why do you think Buddhism has become so popular here if USA is such a “christian society”?
mahatma gandhi hypocrite???