The battle lines have been drawn, dates announced and the political parties have all begun campaigning for the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls in the worlds biggest Democracy – India.
While the elections are held in India, INDIA to is one of the challengers in the fray.
the 26-party alliance led by Congress and others have come together to defeat the might of Bharatiya Janata Party and the popularity of Primne Minister Narendr Modi.
Make no mistake, the efforts put in to bring all parties together is commendabe, but the question is are they really united to fight the BJP.
Actually the recent developments, including the arrest of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has given a shot in the arm for the Opposition, which was down and out after the Ram Mandir inauguration on January 22.
After January 22, the Opposition seemed out of contention and looked in no posiitin to challenge Narendra Modi. But, the Kejriwal arrest has given them some breather.
The Opposition is showing a united front in protest at least on the face of it.
Modi’s popularity going down?
Voters are growing unhappy with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government due to high inflation and unemployment but he is still on track to comfortably win a third term in elections next year due to his personal popularity, a key survey said.
The popularity of main opposition leader Rahul Gandhi has risen and a new, 26-party opposition alliance called “INDIA” is expected to do well, the “Mood of the Nation” survey by India Today magazine says.
Modi, however, is far ahead of Gandhi with a 36-point lead as the candidate best-suited to be India’s next prime minister and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will win 287 seats in the 542-member lower house of parliament if elections are held now, it said.
Promising change, Modi swept to power in 2014, and he has consolidated his hold since with welfare economics, a focus on boosting infrastructure and aggressive Hindu nationalism.
Modi banking on North India…
As India goes to polls in a couple of weeks to elect its next government, pundits’ focus will be on the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s hypnotic sway on the landlocked, impoverished north.
The south’s rejection of the leader and his Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, will be brushed aside because it may not change the overall outcome.
The north hogs the limelight because of its numbers. Whoever controls Uttar Pradesh, a state more populous than Brazil and poorer than sub-Saharan Africa, has superior odds of capturing the reins of federal administration. And there’s a near-consensus that UP and its neighboring states are ready to give the strongman a third term.
The opposition alliance, which accuses him of preparing to sweep the election by jailing its leaders and choking its funds, fears that India’s secular constitution will be upended in Modi 3.0. Although the prime minister has denied any such plan, a Hindu rashtra, or nation-state, will play well in the north.
While regional opposition to the BJP is strong in pockets of south and east India, nationally it is seen as fragmented and weak. Congress party won the state election in Telangana this month but is in power in only three states overall and is perceived as hierarchical and riddled with infighting.
Making India Super Power
Modi’s role in elevating India as a global power – be that in international politics or in the recent its moon landing in August – it was the first country to successfully land a spacecraft near the lunar south pole – was also prominent.
However, whether the BJP will win the same sort of sweeping parliamentary majority it secured in 2019 is unclear. Its position in certain crucial states, such as Bihar and Maharashtra, is uncertain and the party’s weakness on economic problems, particularly jobs and inflation, could also affect voting.
Indeed, one of the biggest issues likely to dominate the BJP’s agenda pre-election is the long-awaited opening of the Ram Mandir, a grand Hindu temple that has been built in the place of a demolished mosque. Construction of the building, in the north Indian town of Ayodhya, has long been a focal point of the Hindu nationalist movement in India, and the fanfare around Modi’s inauguration of the temple later this month in January is expected to be a national event.
