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. Continue reading →

Via a friend on Facebook, I came across the following interview with Tamil Canadian journalist Ignatius Sellah, on CBC. It’s interesting to hear his perspective, and also to see pictures from the recent protests in Toronto:

While the Sri Lankan government is hardly innocent of committing human rights violations, at the current moment the overwhelming evidence from refugees who have escaped the war zone suggests that the LTTE has been holding them hostage. If so, they are more at fault than the Government of Sri Lanka for what is happening to the civilians.

The protesters in Toronto and London may be voicing legitimate concerns about the condition of civilians in the war zone and in the internment centers outside of the war zone. But when they wave LTTE flags, use children as a buffer against the police (in a strange echo of how the real LTTE operate), and talk about genocide, I think they are acting irresponsibly. (Not that her opinion matters all that much — she’s a musician — but I think M.I.A., who has been throwing around the word “genocide” as well lately in her public statements, has also been irresponsible in using that word.)

It’s natural that the people shouting loudest are getting the most attention, but it would be ideal if the media covering these diasporic protests would also represent alternate (i.e., moderate, non-LTTE) points of view. There are plenty of people out there who have real and legitimate grievances regarding the treatment of Tamils in Sri Lanka over the years, who stop well short of supporting this senseless war. Are there other non-LTTE Tamil SL voices you would recommend? Continue reading →

The economic downturn has begun to take its toll on the spread of diversity into the burbs. If what we know from past analysis is true, less immigration equals an even worse economy:

The recession has reduced the growth rate of U.S. Hispanic and Asian populations, the Census said Wednesday, slowing the spread of diversity in American suburbs and exurbs…

The combined growth rate of Asians and Pacific Islanders dropped more than a full percentage point to 2.5% in 2007-2008, compared with 3.7% in 2000-2001, according to the Population Reference Bureau, a nonprofit research group in Washington. The Hispanic growth rate was 3.2% over the latest period, compared with 4% in 2000-2001.

“We have a slowdown in immigration,” said Mark Mather, a PRB demographer.

The worst recession in a generation has prompted people of all races to stay in place, causing a migration drop-off demographers say is among the worst since the Great Depression. One consequence is that minorities, in particular Hispanics, have increasingly stayed in city centers and gateway states where they entered the country, such as California. During the boom years, increased numbers of blacks, Asians and Hispanics moved to the suburbs and exurbs, seeking jobs in places where their numbers were fewer. [Link]

…

“What this means is that the idea of creating new Asian and Hispanic enclaves in different parts of the United States will undergo a bit of a wall,” said Frey. “Those staying in these enclaves will be competing for jobs with long-term residents, while others will return to social support systems in major gateways.” [Link]

This reminds me of the Tom Friedman observations that I blogged about a few months ago.

The Census Bureau projected last August that white children will become the minority in 2023 and the overall white population will follow in 2042. The agency now says it will recalculate those figures, typically updated every three to four years, because they do not fully take into account anti-immigration policies after the September 2001 terror attacks and the current economic crisis. [Link]