Lok Sabha elections 2019

As we had often come back to discussing economic benefits/impact of sports I thought it was about time for an economic discussion forum.
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depleter
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by depleter »

PKBasu wrote: Thu May 23, 2019 8:30 pm . Unnecessarily conceded Andhra to YSRCP.
I doubt they could have done anything this time. As much as there is discontent against CBN, there was some discontent against BJP too. May be next time.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by kaustav »

jayakris wrote: Thu May 23, 2019 9:48 pm
PKBasu wrote: Thu May 23, 2019 8:30 pmBasically Congress is down to Kerala (where it is propped up by Jinnah's legatee party, IUML) and Tamil Nadu (where it is propped up by Periyar's legatee party -- both Jinnah and Periyar were separatists!) and the Patiala maharaja's support base in Punjab (Patiala was one of the key supporters of the British in 1857-58).
Well, Kerala went to Congress basically because the communists went after the God that owns God's own country (Ayyappa of Sabarimala). It made all the Kerala Hindus get pretty angry, and made all the Christians and Muslims (and a good fraction of Hindus) who feared a rise of BJP, turn around and vote enmasse for Congress, who are supposedly a mild and reasonable party in between the satan (CPM) and Yamadharma (BJP). Some sort of strange cross-voting, that fell perfectly in place for Congress. Now, BJP did increase their paltry vote share by about 50% in Kerala, but a lot of left-leaning Hindus who were done with the communists chose to vote for Congress too, as BJP is considered a terrorist party in Kerala thanks to the media that is completely controlled by the Communist and Congress parties. Anyway, yes, Congress has very few places left to hide, and Kerala is the only place where they are still tolerated.
Strange ...I am disheartened with Kerala result...Even people of West Bengal have turned 60 degree but why Kerala is still trusting Gandhi and Co? I dont understand
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by sameerph »

Yes, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Andhra remain only states now where BJP is almost non-existent. It has made big strides first in Karnataka and now in Bengal and Orissa too from that position. Wonder when it will happen in those 3 states. Telangana where it certainly has presence, not sure why nothing in rest of Andhra. Also it looks like Kerala has long tradition of RSS workers, but seems to have no effect on larger population.

I guess Tamil Nadu will be the hardest one to breach. BJP may have to get some good Tamil leader to be able to enter there.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by prasen9 »

A breach actually does not remain a breach forever. You can fool people with words only so many times. This time they have to do something. Last time I checked, there was no substantial gains in human development and about the same with respect to economic performance indicators. I am more non-aligned but maybe socially leftist, economic centrist. I would like a lot of the subsidies cleaned out and the money channeled to social programs that have high payoff primarily in education and health. Let us see if Modi can do that.

The opposition needs to move on to meritocracy with respect to leadership instead of someone inheriting the throne. And, needs better alliances instead of letting the opposition vote getting divided. Of course, the ability to do PR at the Modi-level, which is unparalleled and unprecedented imho.

We may also see states voting differently for central elections as opposed to state. For example, if Bengal has several people from the state in the Centre, they may be able to get some ministries and usually that means some more money flows back to the state than not.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by prasen9 »

Sin Hombre wrote: Sun May 19, 2019 6:11 pm Amazing the number of anti-India hit pieces in the last weeks in the likes of NYT, WaPo etc. We really need to adopting some of China's behaviour when it comes to them.
Which ones are you talking about?
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by jayakris »

kaustav wrote: Fri May 24, 2019 6:24 amStrange ...I am disheartened with Kerala result...Even people of West Bengal have turned 60 degree but why Kerala is still trusting Gandhi and Co? I dont understand
They are not trusting Gandhi and Co (except in the Malappuram/Wayanad area where the Muslims will vote for them). The Kerala people voted for the Congress candidates because they are considered moderate guys. CPM again proved themselves to be extreme at the left, and BJP is touted by the Malayalam media as a VERY scary option at the other end of the spectrum (the "right"). BJP is only for religious disharmony and all that blah blah, when Muslim League and parties that Christians support like Kerala Congress are all "secular". Give me a friggin break. Malayali Hindus need to get a grip on themselves and vote for BJP if they find the candidate good. But then the Malayalees are usually "full of themselves". Especially the Malayali Hindus who voted for CPM all along. We call them "buddhijeevis" in Malayalam (intelligentsia). They think they have all the answers. These are the guys who say "I am a Hindu, but not a practicing Hindu", or say "Hinduism is a way of life" -- and all that bullshit given to them by the sneaky leftists in media/press. But what happened this time is that a lot of buddhijeevis got out of the CPM camp, because they (especially women) just could not stand what the Communists did to their deity at Sabarimala. But these buddhijeevis still cannot make themselves vote for BJP, the terrorist party. So they all voted for Congress. That is what happened.

People moved from left to center this time, and they will move further later. It may only a matter of time, albeit as long as 15-20 years, before communism dies in Kerala and these Kerala Hindus finally move more "right" of center to BJP. It was shock treatment to them this time with Sabarimala. It will take some work by Kerala BJP and RSS to move them more, though, as the Christians and Muslims will fight tooth and nail to keep them on the Congress side.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by prasen9 »

Politics is never linear Jay. If the current government continues its performance, which is about the same as the ones before it, and people's lives do not really improve at a faster pace, then even the well-run PR engine may not be able to have people not want to change the course. Of course, there has to be an opposition first before it can win. Hereditary succession is not conducive to winning elections. The opposition needs to prevent the division of the opposition votes and have a credibly cohesive opposition though. Don't know if it will happen in five years but I don't think PR only can win more than 3 elections in a row.

Hopefully some clean politician will emerge who will flush out all these also-rans.

I doubt that the people of Kerala will vote based on their religion. Or for that matter, I have faith that the country will not vote only based on religion. Economic performance matters too. A lot of commoners know that "religion" is only used to rouse emotions to get power. I don't think Modi's win is because the country has moved to the right religiously although the politics of division and fear does play an important role. Imho, this win was more because maybe the country felt TINA.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by sameerph »

Yes, there is a strong TINA factor. But, BJP increased it's vote share by almost 10% in this election. It's vote share was more than 50% in most of the states. One cannot get such large votes only on negative factors. Modi ( more than BJP) still retains the image as someone who can turn things around for India. Despite somewhat failed demonetization and GST implementation, people have put behind the difficulties they had to face at that time and voted for him because they believe his intentions are good.

I agree with you that not many did not vote them based on religion only and the economic perforamance has to be much better in next 5 years for them to enjoy same success 5 years later.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by prasen9 »

Yes. This is a vote of hope and the fact that nobody else has made a case for themselves. If there was someone who demonstrated competence, maybe at the state level, then this election could have been run on the basis of competence versus the errors Modi made. But the cupboard is bare because the other party, Congress, has become a hegemony and a hereditary cesspool. So, the populace just gave him five more years. The opposition needs to unite and let people rise on the basis of their ideas and work and not just birth.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by ankit1407 »

Modi did deserve a second chance and am glad he got it .. he did good or bad in first term is going to show up in next 5 years and post that Bjp would have no place to hide if neec to .. I do hope that we see growth and good governance in next 5 years .. Cong seems in no mood to let go of family business and keeps making life easier for Modi..Left is and will always be useless ..
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by PKBasu »

Sorry, prasen9, you are hopelessly wrong. The reason why Modi got such a resounding endorsement from the Indian electorate is because the lives of the poor (especially in rural India) have been fundamentally transformed in the past 5 years. Only about 40% of rural households had bank accounts in 2014, over 99% have them now -- and government benefits are being directly transferred into those accounts. Less than half of rural households had access to a toilet at home or in school in 2014, virtually all households have them now. Only 35% of rural homes had access to LPG (cooking gas) connections, 90% have them now. Plus there has been a 5-fold increase in the rural home-building programme, and 130 million microfinance loans have been made (giving rural folks their first step in their entrepreneurial journeys). Plus universal health insurance now exists, benefitting millions of the rural poor.

If this is not transformative, I don't know what is. PLUS, India has been the fastest-growing economy in the world over 4 of the past 5 years, the average inflation rate has been 4% over the past 5 years (versus 10%+ in the previous 5), and contrary to the nonsense put out by Congress' vast media machine, India's exports (of goods) have outperformed China (and the rest of Asia except Vietnam) in 2016, 2017, 2018, and in the year-to-date this year. While the global electronics cycle has slumped over the past 6 months (causing a contraction in Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Indonesia's exports in each of the past 6 months), India's exports have grown every month (year over year), and India's electronics exports rose nearly 50% in FY2018/19. Electronic exports are only 3% of India's exports, but represent the rise of the Make in India phenomenon, which will take off in the next 5 years.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by jayakris »

PKBasu wrote: Wed May 29, 2019 6:55 amSorry, prasen9, you are hopelessly wrong. The reason why Modi got such a resounding endorsement from the Indian electorate is because the lives of the poor (especially in rural India) have been fundamentally transformed in the past 5 years. Only about 40% of rural households had bank accounts in 2014, over 99% have them now -- and government benefits are being directly transferred into those accounts. Less than half of rural households had access to a toilet at home or in school in 2014, virtually all households have them now. Only 35% of rural homes had access to LPG (cooking gas) connections, 90% have them now. Plus there has been a 5-fold increase in the rural home-building programme, and 130 million microfinance loans have been made (giving rural folks their first step in their entrepreneurial journeys). Plus universal health insurance now exists, benefitting millions of the rural poor.
Is that all correct, PKB? I keep getting all this sent by the sangh parivar social media machine, but I normally just disregard much of it (as a lot of lies also come from them). I am a solid Hindutva guy and make no bones about it, so I do not need their exaggerations. But what you are saying is that Modi has actually been doing all this? :) ... The staunchly leftist press/media will not mention anything much, and will only talk about what Modi isn't doing and not on anything he does. I take it that the truth on what Modi has done is somewhere in between the extreme narratives. That is good enough for me. At least he is doing something. I hardly know of any former prime minister tackling issues like public defecation (the #1 issue I wanted tackled in India for some 30 years, and never saw being addressed), or any "fundamental" societal issue, really!
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by prasen9 »

It will take me some time to fact-check the claims. The toilets were being done by the UPA governments for many years. Modi accelerated the rate. And then made fake claims that everyone has toilets which were verified to be not true. I don't care much about any party per se although my leaning is towards the left with respect to certainly social issues and may be way left with respect to the garbage that this government's officials spew about pseudo-science. Bank accounts themselves do not do anything just like demonetization by itself does not do anything. Let us see if the bank accounts result in real measurable changes in people's lives not just in theory. Having said that, I will fact check your claims and compare it in perspective versus the previous regimes and comment. I checked the human development index and the growth rate and there is hardly any change.

Public defacation has been addressed by many governments. None are as good at PR to claim they have done it all on their own while building on the infrastructure built by previous governments. Here is an article about a town in Himachal that was supposedly public-defacation-free and that happened before Modi. Mashobra

Lives of the poor have not been fundamentally changed. Only the Modi PR machine and its bhakts would claim so. The Human Development Index does not lie. On any social statistic, there has been marginal changes not "fundamental". On the other hand, this government has enabled record pollution and environmental destruction while indulging in Orwelian talk about Swacch Bharat. Taken all together, whatever has happened is progress but it is diddly squat.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by PKBasu »

Mashobra is one of the best developed towns in the country, where Jawaharlal Nehru and Edwina Mountbatten's affair flowered in April 1947 -- helped along by Dickie (there is a great photo of the Viceroy sitting in the front of the car alongside the driver, while his wife and her lover Jawaharlal chat away at the back :-) ). Citing the fact that it was public defecation-free in 2011 is neither here nor there.
The vast Congress machine tries to say that everything was started by them -- but the problem was that they hardly got anywhere. So more than half of our rural households had no bank accounts, and the Jan Dhan Yojana dramatically changed that over the first couple of years of Modi 1.0. Almost everybody has bank accounts now: there are some problems, including the oft-cited fact in 2016 that many of these were zero-balance accounts. But once the accounts existed, and everybody had an Aadhar number, direct benefit transfers have begun into those accounts. Rajiv Gandhi had pointed out in 1985 (in his first flush of enthusiasm as PM) that just 17% of what was supposed to reach the poor actually did, the rest being stolen by various intermediaries. That is what has changed dramatically now.
Similarly with becoming public defecation-free. The poorer villages -- more than half of them -- are the ones that needed to be addressed, as did the national culture and attitude toward public defecation and using toilets instead. The massive campaign of toilet-building and public advertising has made a dramatic positive difference nationwide.
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Re: Lok Sabha elections 2019

Post by jayakris »

PKBasu wrote: Sat Jun 01, 2019 12:36 amThe vast Congress machine tries to say that everything was started by them -- but the problem was that they hardly got anywhere.
Bam! Boom! This is the truth. Couldn't have said it better, nor more succinctly. I just have to give credit to Modi for tackling some vexing issues and actually making improvements that everybody can notice. That is in contrast to superficial starts and lip-service from many PMs, starting with Nehru.

But having said that, my issue is that the overall numbers on our economy are continuing to be a problem. Here is the latest- GDP growth slumps to 5.8% ... That just won't do. This is a sustained slowdown and we cannot afford to have it go on for ever. Earlier there was the excuse of the double-shock of demonetization and GST. But the slowdown after we started picking by early last year, is troublesome. What is ailing our economy?

And then we have Unemployment rate at 45-year high, confirms Labour Ministry data ... That is another problem.

If Modiji does not focus on the forest rather than the trees, it will again be "the economy, stupid" next time, even if it wasn't this time.
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