New Delhi: In a historic election that would could have far-reaching implications for India's polity and its policies, Narendra Modi, a rank outsider to Delhi's politics, was poised to become the 14th prime minister of this diverse nation of 1.2 billion people, storming into its citadels of power by decimating the Congress party that has ruled the country for much of the period since its independence. "I have been elected as the prime worker of the people," said Modi, seeking to project his humility in a victory speech at Vadodara, in Gujarat, to almost rockstar-like adulation from screaming supporters, both men and women and thousands of young people. Modi won with a parliamentary record margin of over 570,000 votes from Vadodara, one of the two constituencies from which he contested, the other being Varanasi, from where also he won.
"All the people of this country are ours. It is our responsibility to take everyone along. Our mission will be: With all, development for all," said he, seeking to allay fears among minorities about his rise. Modi pointed out to resounding cheers from the crowd how this was the first time that a non-Congress party had got a majority on its own in a national election in India that was followed keenly around the world. A host of global leaders from Britain, Japan, Israel, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Australia rang up or sent congratulatory messages to Modi, who is widely expected to have a more muscular foreign policy and even changes some of India's international equations.
The stock market shot up on news of the imminent BJP victory even as India Inc looked to a "industry-friendly" Modi to lift a flagging economy and restore investor confidence in the world's third largest economy. The Congress, India's oldest party which had ruled the country for a decade since 2004, faced its worst humiliation, raising question marks about the future of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty that has given India most of its prime ministers. Congress' de facto prime ministerial candidate Rahul Gandhi, whose father, grandmother and great grandfather were all prime ministers, was humbled by Modi in a way that the Congress plummeted to its lowest ever two-digit tally in a national election.
It had won 206 seats in the last election in 2009. On the other hand, the BJP, which debuted as a party with just two seats in 1984 when the Congress won a record 414 seats, has secured absolute majority winning 283 seats without any of its allies. "It is the start of a new era in Indian politics," exclaimed Rajnath Singh, the BJP president whose audacious move to name Modi as the prime ministerial candidate of the party late last year upset the veterans but was wholeheartedly endorsed by the party rank and file. Even political pundits gasped at the sheer scale of the BJP's sweep that election officials said was poised to give it a comfortable majority in the 545-member Lok Sabha even without the aid of its old and new allies. The Congress did not win a single seat in seven states and it was unlikely to win more than 10 seats in any state. Riding on the anti-incumbency and Modi factor, BJP made a clean sweep in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Delhi, Uttarakhand, Himachal and Goa accounting for 69 seats.
The worst ever performance by the Congress in the Lok Sabha election has reduced it to such a level that the party may even lose the status of opposition in Lok Sabha. Though it still has the highest numerical strength among all opposition parties, its tally does not constitute the one-tenth strength (54) of the Lok Sabha — making it ineligible for being considered as the party whose member can be a leader of the opposition. This situation will, on the other hand, give a free run to the government where it mandatorily requires the opinion of the opposition leader while making key appointments in the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), Lokpal and CBI.
Eminent constitutional expert and former secretary-general of the Lok Sabha Subhash C Kashyap said that no party would qualify to be as opposition leader as none of them had won the minimum 10% (54) of the Lok Sabha seats. "There will be different opposition parties in the new Lok Sabha. Each party will have their own leader. But none of them would be recognized as opposition leader who qualifies to get perks, salaries and allowances that are the same as a Cabinet minister under the existing rule," Kashyap said.
Outgoing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh congratulated Modi, who is still the Gujarat chief minister. Congress president Sonia Gandhi, who won easily from Rae Bareli along with her son Rahul Gandhi (Amethi), took responsibility for the defeat but was criticised for not being gracious enough to congratulate Modi. "The people's verdict is against us," Gandhi said. Congress strategist and former minister Jairam Ramesh summed up the mood in the country's grand old party by saying: "Our performance is worse than the worst case scenario."
