Live: Election Day reults of 4 Indian states

[Sachin=GOD]

Good to hear that the BJP is doing good work in MP and Ch'garh. They really fecked up in Rajasthan. What prevented them to do well in Rajasthan? @ Mariyam, I think I understand what Finey is saying. "Zha" is pronunced in the same way as "ul" in Sitabuldi (a place in Nagpur) is pronounced in Marathi. It's pronounced as "Sitabardi". Same way Azhagiri is pronounced as Arhagiri and Kanimozhi as Kanimorhi..However that "rha" is actualy coming from "la", a STRONG "L"..

the Gujjar's protest for reservation was very badly handled by the CM and as a result their entire community decided to support Congress and therefore BJP lost. The margin of victory for Congress was'nt that big and if that situation had been handled well by the CM then BJP would still be in power. Also, the CM was a bit out of touch with the general public and had a rift with some of the senior state leaders.

[saneindian]

Good to hear that the BJP is doing good work in MP and Ch'garh. They really fecked up in Rajasthan. What prevented them to do well in Rajasthan?

Poor choice of candidates, too much infighting and Vasundhara Raje's dictatorial style. The party wanted to drop non performing MLAs, but nearly all of them were Vasundhara supporters and somehow managed to retain their ticket. No surprises, they all lost. The good news for BJP is that Gehlot is running a highly inefficient and corrupt govt. BJP should be coming back to power in the next elections.

[Sachin=GOD]

Poor choice of candidates, too much infighting and Vasundhara Raje's dictatorial style. The party wanted to drop non performing MLAs, but nearly all of them were Vasundhara supporters and somehow managed to retain their ticket. No surprises, they all lost. The good news for BJP is that Gehlot is running a highly inefficient and corrupt govt. BJP should be coming back to power in the next elections.

and also Vasundhara Raje has toned down a bit and some of her high handedness is gone.

[Mariyam]

Karunanidhi deserved to lose the election. Just look at the haphazard way in which he has gone about naming his kids. One of his son's is called Stalin and his daughter is called Kanimozhi. Wth??? There seems to be no connect at all between the names of the siblings. While the name of the son exudes authoritarianism the daughters name seems like an attempt to get maximum points at a game of scrabble. Hearing the two names we would never be able to tell if they are siblings. You either name them Stalin and Joan of Arc, or you name them Kanimozhi and Venugopalazhan ( or something traditionally Tamil). You can't have it both ways.

[urbestfriend]

Karunanidhi deserved to lose the election. Just look at the haphazard way in which he has gone about naming his kids. One of his son's is called Stalin and his daughter is called Kanimozhi. Wth??? There seems to be no connect at all between the names of the siblings. While the name of the son exudes authoritarianism the daughters name seems like an attempt to get maximum points at a game of scrabble. Hearing the two names we would never be able to tell if they are siblings. You either name them Stalin and Joan of Arc, or you name them Kanimozhi and Venugopalazhan ( or something traditionally Tamil). You can't have it both ways.

Why blame poor Karuna for his wives fault?? Its their mothers who named them , by the time these kids were born Karuna would be enjoying with his nth wife.

[jaggadaku]

Amazing, 13 Cpm Born on 1964 & after 13 Years Came to Power, TMC born on 1998, after 13 year is 2011 came to power Counting Date 13 May = 1+3+0+5+2+0+1+1= 13 The slogan - Maa mati Manush = 13 letters, ...Mamta Banerjee = 13 letters, Chief Minister = 13 letters, Fri day the 13th 2011

[Sachin=GOD]

A case for restraint and moderation -Gopalkirshna Gandhi: In the context of the election results, nothing so becomes a victor as grace in success, and nothing makes victory seem so well deserved as courtesy towards the one who has lost.

This is a season of celebration, and of lamentation. Elections have distributed success and failure, victory and defeat. This is not an hour for restraint. And yet, that is exactly what it should be. In the elections held in 1934 to the Central Legislative Assembly, the Madras Presidency had 16 seats. Of these, three were reserved for Muslims and one each for the Depressed Classes and Landholders. In effect, the Congress had 11 seats to contest. Robust opposition was given to the Congress candidates by the Justice Party, which was in power in the Province. The Congress, which had been conducting a spirited campaign against untouchability and for social reform, faced opposition from the orthodox sections of the Madras population as well. “In the name of Brahma, Vishnu and Siva,” a leaflet said, “we exhort you to teach those who wish to interfere with our religion a lesson they will never forget. Will you vote for God or for Mr. Rajagopalachari and his Congress nominees?” The Presidency's voters were not awed by God. Certainly not by that version of God. They voted, in that election, emphatically for the Congress, which won all 11 seats. “You have reason to be proud of your marvellous achievement,” Congress President Vallabhbhai Patel wired CR. Did crackers go off? CR, as President of the Tamilnad Congress, had some suggestions for his party on how to take victory. “This is an hour of restraint,” he wrote to S. Satyamurti who had won a dramatic victory in the Madras seat over Sir A. Ramaswami Mudaliar. “Our success,” he said, “is no disgrace for our opponents. You must enforce this in all your talks, private or public.” Seventy-seven years on, after results for the elections held for five legislatures have all come in, it is worth asking: have restraint and moderation marked its successes? Or are we proving right the words of Oscar Wilde: “Moderation is a fatal thing, nothing succeeds like excess.” Wilde has also said something that would fit perfectly a victorious candidate's feelings in a ‘hung' verdict: “The play was a great success, but the audience was a disaster.” Indian voters voting for governments within the States have disfavoured ambiguity. They have generally been voting emphatically, making the ‘play' and the ‘audience' agree with each other. It is another matter that the regional votes, categorical in themselves, when put together on to the chequerboard of our parliamentary results, have yielded less than a two-thirds or a three-fourths majority for the number one party. But to come back to success and failure, victory and defeat. Nothing so ill becomes a victor as gloating, nothing reflects so well on success as sobriety. In the 1962 election to the Lok Sabha, the constituency of North Bombay saw a celebrated contest between V.K. Krishna Menon from the Congress and Acharya Kripalani, an independent supported by almost the entire Opposition. “A vote against Menon is a vote against me,” Prime Minister Nehru had said. And campaigning for the battle-scarred freedom warrior, Rajagopalachari had “blessed” the Acharya, calling his contest a great gain for democracy “whether we win or not.” Krishna Menon won, resoundingly. And the first thing he did was to call on the defeated veteran in his temporary abode in the city to which neither belonged. In 1977, when the democratic opposition led by Jayaprakash Narayan won a victory that would have been thought impossible even a few weeks earlier, the man of whom it was said, “not since Mahatma Gandhi has a single individual without power of office exerted as much influence on India,” did something that would have been thought equally impossible. Shortly after the Janata government had been installed, JP called on Indira Gandhi, against whose National Emergency he had pitted his lifetime's reputation as a political organiser, and his renal health as well. In 2004, after being sworn in Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh observed a high-minded practice in calling on the man he had faced as the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha for five tense years and whom he was now succeeding — Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Nothing so becomes a victor as grace in success, nothing makes victory seem so well deserved as courtesy towards the one who has lost. But there is more to the ambient dynamics of victory and defeat than the grace or gracelessness that can accompany them. Something integral to the contestation itself is involved. And that, in a mature democracy, is the acknowledgment of three features of elective trust: first, its conditionality; second, its reversibility; and, third, its supremacy. The voter reposes trust, rather than power. The elector confers opportunity rather than sovereignty. The elected are wont to regard victory as anointing, success as coronation. They are in grievous error, even if only momentary, in thinking so. And in the progress towards the moment longed for they believe, mistakenly in large part, that elective trust is manipulable, purchasable and eternal. Whence, the celebration with crackers, with colours, with conceit. To go back to the most democratic organisation in the country before Independence, we must not forget that Gandhi, yes, the Mahatma himself, was virtually outvoted within the Congress when at Haripura in 1938 the AICC set his nominee Pattabhi Sitaramayya aside and elected Subhas Chandra Bose as President of the organisation. We must not forget that in 1967, the invincible Kumaraswami Kamaraj, who had said he would win his seat in Virudhunagar “without disturbing his sleep,” was defeated by an unknown, Parimalam Srinivasan. We must not forget that in the same year, Bombay's strongman S.K. Patil was defeated by 37-year-old George Fernandes in an incredible result. We must not forget that in 1984 the redoubtable and respected Somnath Chatterjee was defeated by a 29-year-old Mamata Banerjee in what came to be called a ‘giant-killing' contest in Jadavpur. Howsoever strong the political claimant, the individual with the vote in the collectivity of voting, is infinitely stronger. And, more pertinently, like the proverbially high-on-memory elephant, the voter makes a quiet decision about when to garland the wooer and when to twirl its trunk around the dazed supplicant and, lifting the prone frame high, bring it down to earth. It is a truism that the Indian voter cannot be taken for granted. It follows that candidates cannot be complacent. Also, that victors need not gloat and those defeated – I do not wish to use the phrase ‘vanquished' – need not lament. But more important than this, those elected, whether they sit in the Opposition benches or with the ruling party, should know that the vote is a notice, not a certificate. They should know that the dust of defeat and the syrup of success rest in adjoining jars. The first is invariably earned retrospectively. The second is received on trust conditionally, retrievably, and with the confidence of ownership. It can be taken right back unless two things are respected: First, the dignity of the voter who is indistinguishable from the travails of India's common humanity. Second, the intelligence of the voter, which is no less than any master mathematician working on Differential Calculus. (Gopalkrishna Gandhi is a former Governor of West Bengal.)

The Hindu Fantastic article.