Jump to content

The Indian Elections Thread


The Outsider

The Indian Elections Thread  

  1. 1.

    • BJP/NDA
      28
    • Congress/UPA
      6
    • Third Front
      0
    • Undecided
      6


Recommended Posts

I hope BJP comes to power being lead by a sauve clean politician like Arun Jaitley and the BJP distances itself from Shiv Sena, Bajrang Dal or any "Mandir" crap but focuses itself on its strength i.e. strong discipline in administration ( the basis fro original Jan Sangh). I also hope that whoever comes to power still retains Manmomhan Singh as Finance Minister. Leftists and Communist party is a joke, clean leaders from Congress should get elected in their constituencies to do good work and most of all I hope cross-party committees are formed to address key issues facing the nation to solve them rather than constant bickering on "mandir", appeasment of minority vote, Mayawati's crap power status etc etc. The problem is that such a combination is just hope and impossible to achieve.
Wow! Thats some wishlist you have. No harm in dreaming. I hope BJP wins and LKA is PM. If anyone can be credited with the rise of BJP it has to be Advani, and he should have been PM before Vajpayee.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Given the infighting that's taking place and the thanda campaigning from Advani, BJP don't look like winning majority of the seats. However, the Jaitley-Singh fight seems to be on the mend as Mittal has been removed from his co-ordinator post. I would still vote for them though because they are better than Congress and *shudder* the Third Front. (why TDP joined them is something I'll never understand)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

TVR SHENOY calls out Third Front for what it is All is maya!" So said Adi Shankaracharya centuries ago. And that sums up the so-called Third Front as we stand on the cusp of a General Election. The Third Front, as it exists today, is a mere illusion. Does it have a common programme to which every constituent subscribes? Who is the chairman or the convenor of the Third Front? If this mob succeeds in coming to power -- probably after conning the Congress -- who shall be the prime minister? Does it possess even those minimal measures of credibility, namely a common list of candidates and an accepted nominee for the prime ministerial chair? Don't hold your breath waiting for anyone in the Third Front to answer those questions! Their response to everything boils down to: "Everything will be revealed once the elections are over!" In other words, what the Third Front truly desires is a blank cheque from the people of India. The Third Front spits on democracy when asked about the top job. How will their prime minister be decided? Behind closed doors, and with only party leaders -- most of whom will not be Lok Sabha MPs -- having a say. At all costs, you see, the people of India must not be given a say in the matter! The dishonesty is even more apparent when asked if the Third Front is going to have electoral understandings. It will not. Various constituents of the putative Third Front will be fighting each other. Mayawati [images], who deserves kudos for her honesty in this instance, has cheerfully announced that the Bahujan Samaj Party shall be putting up candidates in every state, from Uttar Pradesh [images] to Tamil Nadu. In other words, she will be fighting not just the Bharatiya Janata Party [images] and the Congress but also the All India Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the Janata Dal-Secular. Some alliance! Come to that, would it make a difference even if the Third Front parties got their together and came up with a list of candidates? Common sense says that it does not have a prayer of winning a majority in the next Lok Sabha. I said in my last column that the BJP was, for all practical purposes, without any presence on the ground in a list of coastline states (and one Union territory) running from West Bengal to Kerala [images]. I said that these accounted for 165 Lok Sabha seats. With the possible exception of Orissa -- some would argue with even that -- it is difficult to see how the BJP could win from any of these areas. Let me now give you the flip side of that equation. As it happens these 165 seats are the bastions of the Third Front. Let us assume that the BSP is part of the Third Front -- which Mayawati denies -- and add Uttar Pradesh's 80 seats to the total. Third Front apologists might also wish to add Karnataka's 28 seats since H D Deve Gowda's JD-S has a presence in the state. Add up all of those and you get a grand figure of 273. The magic figure in the Lok Sabha is 272, the barest of bare majorities in a 543-strong House. Does anyone believe that the Third Front shall win every single one of those 273 seats? That the Congress will make no gains in, say, Kerala (where it was wiped out in 2004)? Or that the BJP will lose every seat in Karnataka (where it won the 2008 assembly polls)? Or that the Samajwadi Party will be wiped out in Uttar Pradesh, and the DMK in Tamil Nadu? Let us say that the Third Front parties collectively win, say, 137 seats, roughly half of those 273 seats. Let us even assume that they get two-thirds of those constituencies, meaning 182 seats. Realistically, there is no way that the Third Front is going to win 272 seats, a majority in the Lok Sabha, by contesting just those 273 seats. So where can the Third Front make up the numbers? The Marxists have been around for decades, and they are confined to West Bengal, Kerala, and Tripura. Mayawati has prime ministerial ambitions, but the reality is that her party has not done particularly well outside Uttar Pradesh. Of course, the Third Front can ratchet up the numbers by wooing away chunks of the National Democratic Alliance or the United Progressive Alliance. This logic suggests that the various leaders must spend time dancing around, say, the Janata Dal-United, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, or even the Nationalist Congress Party. But no, both history and logic suggest that the only realistic option is to join hands with the Congress. There is no dearth of precedents, that is what happened both in 1996 and in 2004. It would be more honest to admit this outright, but neither the Congress nor the Third Front can do so. Until, that is, the BJP needs to be kept out in the sacred name of 'secularism'. I cannot end without showing what this 'secularism' consists of, in one of those states where the BJP is absent. In Kerala there is open talk of bishops sending a list of candidates to the Congress high command in Delhi [images]. Meanwhile the CPI-M and the CPI are snuggling up to the likes of the National Development Front and the People's Democratic Party, Muslim parties that are beyond the fringe of the Muslim League. Such 'secularism' is a dangerous illusion. Even more so, perhaps, as the sleight of hand called the 'Third Front'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I dont have any problems with Third front. The way I see it third front is nothing but reflective of India as such. We have a vast majority of educated Indians who are unable to communicate with their own countrymen in a native language. Any which way you wanna spin it the fact is there is reservation against Hindi, even though Hindi has most speaker in India. Well guess what if you can not communicate with your own countrymen you can also kiss goodbye the concept of non-Hindi politicians being embraced by Hindi belt. A Naidu, a Jayalalitha will never strike a chord with rest of the country. End of the story. All these pockets of non-Hindi influence will keep rallying to third front, which has been aptly called as parking lot. Serves them right too I say. The only two parties that are National are also the only two parties whose language is understood by the most. xxx

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What exactly is Third Frnt?? Do they have anything common? Yes they have, Stop non secular party to come to power. thats only thing unites them. I am hoping indian voters are smart enough not to vote them atleast. I can live with Congress or BJP, but TP will be dooomsday.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What exactly is Third Frnt?? Do they have anything common? Yes they have, Stop non secular party to come to power. thats only thing unites them. I am hoping indian voters are smart enough not to vote them atleast. I can live with Congress or BJP, but TP will be dooomsday.
Did you read the last part of my post ?
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sriram, as things stand right now I don't really see scenarios 1 and 2 happening. 240 is a huge number for either the Congress or BJP alliance to rack up given the fact that both have been very ineffective in forming viable coalitions till now. My predictions as of now based on pre-poll alliances is : 1. Congress+ - 180 2. BJP+ - 160 3. Third Front - 160 At the moment it looks like we are going to get a very murky parliament - the last thing which India needs at the moment.
agree.....The third front is basically made up of opportunistic fence sitters .Once the election results are out,The third front will break up and the various fractions will go to either of the two camps.They cannot survive on their own because of two many 'future prime ministers' in the front. I would love to see both Maya aunty and Jaya aunty get same number of seats and then watch the Tamasha!:--D
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just for this ****, the EC needs to change its rules that no alliances are alowed post elections except outside support, and if that is the case, the party giving outside support does not get any ministerial positions.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just for this ****' date=' the EC needs to change its rules that no alliances are alowed post elections except outside support, and if that is the case, the party giving outside support does not get any ministerial positions.[/quote'] They cant do that because it is an unconstitutional ruling that wont stand in the court of law.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

agree.....The third front is basically made up of opportunistic fence sitters .Once the election results are out' date=The third front will break up and the various fractions will go to either of the two camps.They cannot survive on their own because of two many 'future prime ministers' in the front. I would love to see both Maya aunty and Jaya aunty get same number of seats and then watch the Tamasha!:--D
That is quite true. There is no binding force as such among the third front participants, no common thread that holds them together, unlike the BJP front which shares the right-wing ideology or the Cong group which swears allegiance to the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. The third front is just a rabble of parties who are clearly fed up of playing second fiddle to either Cong or BJP and want to get their hands on power. If they do well (150+ seats), they could potentially stay on for longer as a group. But, if they don’t do well (
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am assuming its not stated in our constitution as such, but nowhere does it explicitly state that post-poll alliances should not be allowed, so any ruling about the same will definitely be challenged in the court of law. But, lets not forget that the option of changing your alliance partner after the polls acts as one of the checks and balances of democracy. A party may decide to withdraw support to one party if that party was pursuing anti-people policies. In that case, the law should not stop them. Of course, our politicians mostly misuse this freedom to engage in horse-trading, but unfortunately, it cannot be regulated by law.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just for this ****' date=' the EC needs to change its rules that no alliances are alowed post elections except outside support, and if that is the case, the party giving outside support does not get any ministerial positions.[/quote'] That may lead to hung parliament, and the whole election sham will have to be repeated...we can't afford that ****.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am assuming its not stated in our constitution as such, but nowhere does it explicitly state that post-poll alliances should not be allowed, so any ruling about the same will definitely be challenged in the court of law. But, lets not forget that the option of changing your alliance partner after the polls acts as one of the checks and balances of democracy. A party may decide to withdraw support to one party if that party was pursuing anti-people policies. In that case, the law should not stop them. Of course, our politicians mostly misuse this freedom to engage in horse-trading, but unfortunately, it cannot be regulated by law.
They can pull out or join in, but if we remove the ministerial positions and base it on ideology alone then it would be better.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...