NEW DELHI – Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was meeting party alliesand members of his cabinet Friday to plot a course for his second termafter a landslide victory left the once-mighty Gandhi dynasty licking itswounds.
A considerable to-do list includes addressing India’s lacklustre economicgrowth and reducing unemployment, as well as fixing a stricken agriculturesector on which 70 percent of households depend.
Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was projected tosweep 303 seats in parliament, giving it an even bigger majority than fiveyears ago and defying predictions of a dip.
The main opposition Congress party, which has ruled the roost in India formuch of its post-independence history, improved on its historic low fiveyears ago of 44 seats but still only managed a paltry 52.
Congress chief Rahul Gandhi even lost his own seat in Amethi, long a familybastion. He did win a seat in the southern state of Kerala, however, aquirk allowed under Indian election rules.
Chinese President Xi Jinping, meanwhile, joined a chorus of internationalwell-wishers, with US President Donald Trump hailing Modi’s “BIG” win andeven Pakistan’s Imran Khan tweeting congratulations.
On Thursday there were delirious scenes at BJP party offices across thenation of 1.3 billion people, including its headquarters where Modi wasshowered with petals by chanting fans.
“The voting numbers in India’s election is the biggest event in the historyof (the) democratic world. The entire world has to recognise the democraticstrength of India,” Modi told cheering crowds.
“Modi will make India great again. Modi is the strongest prime ministerIndia has ever had and will get. We need to support his policies toprosper,” said one supporter, Santosh Joshi.
Modi, 68, conferred with party allies on Friday ahead of a cabinet meetinglater in the day, after which the president was due formally to dissolvethe outgoing parliament.
-‘Can Modi deliver?’ –
With the election behind him, Modi must now tackle the economy andunemployment — notably among women, who have one of the lowest labourmarket participation rates in the world.
“The real question is can Modi deliver on his economic commitments — forexample creating the high number of jobs needed?,” said Champa Patel, ofthe Chatham House think-tank.
“This is essential to address India’s growing wealth inequalities. Can headdress the challenges that millions of Indians face on a daily basis in ahighly stratified country?”
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India’s agriculture industry is also in a dire state with drought, lowprices and debt driving thousands of farmers to suicide in recent years.
The country’s waterways are filthy and India is home to 22 of the world’s30 most polluted cities, killing 1.24 million people early in 2017according to a Lancet Planetary Health study.
Modi and the Hindu nationalist BJP must also try to heal divisions whichhave left religious minorities — including India’s 170 million Muslims –feeling anxious for the future.
During the campaign he managed to deflect criticism on these issues byfocusing on national security, claiming he alone could defend India.
Congress meanwhile was picking up the pieces after the second electiondebacle in a row, having failed to win a single seat in 13 states and fiveunion territories.
These included Rajasthan where it won state elections late last year. Thistime the BJP swept all 25 seats, and in Uttar Pradesh Congress took justone constituency.
An anti-Modi alliance in Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state with200 million people, also failed to prevent the BJP juggernaut sweeping 64out of 80 seats.
Even in West Bengal, run by formidable Modi critic Mamata Banerjee, the BJPmade major inroads, boosting its seat tally from two to 18.
Congress on Friday was forced to deny media reports that Gandhi — thegreat-grandson, grandson and son of three former premiers — had offered tothrow in the towel.
“The Congress leadership has clearly failed. It is a discredited andbankrupt leadership,” Kanchan Gupta from the Observer Research Foundationthink-tank told AFP.
“It is astonishing that Rahul Gandhi has not yet resigned”, RamachandraGuha, a renowned historian, said on Twitter. “The Congress should dump theDynasty.” – APP/AFP
