"Sheer size is just 1 complexity in Indian election" by Nirmala George | Associated Press April 03, 2014
NEW DELHI — In a country where men have long told their wives whom to vote for, Sheila Kumar says she has no intention of letting her husband dictate her vote in the upcoming national election.
‘‘Never again,’’ Kumar said as she waited to collect a bucket of drinking water from the communal tap in a south Delhi slum.
She sounds every bit the modern Indian woman, a reflection of a country with many of the outward signs of modernity: the glitzy shopping malls, the tech-savvy billionaires and the burgeoning focus on women’s rights.
But it’s not so simple. Because even if she won’t allow her husband to choose her candidate, there is someone else who gets that power.
‘‘The caste elders will decide who we should vote for,’’ said Kumar, 43, a member of the small, midlevel Kurmi caste. ‘‘We will vote for someone from our own caste. Why should we support anyone else?’’
As the world’s largest democracy heads to the polls starting Monday, India’s often baffling contradictions are on full display, with age-old traditions of caste loyalty, patriarchy, and nepotism often clashing with the values of a modern world.
But even though democracy is far from perfect here, it still lurches forward. Elections in India are generally considered free and fair, and even the powerful often fall to defeat at the hands of voters.
A strong constitution, hammered out by political leaders who were veterans of India’s struggle for independence from British colonial rule, laid the foundations for the democratic process. The politically independent Election Commission, empowered by the constitution, has the last word on political wrangles.
‘‘Politicians know that they are accountable to their electorate. If people have voted them into office, they can just as easily toss them out in the next election,’’ said Ajoy Bose, a political commentator in New Delhi.
Still, the challenges are rife. Voting patterns are heavily influenced by caste, the complex social ladder that mobilizes entire communities. Although India’s constitution and laws forbid discrimination on the basis of caste, the social division continues to dominate electoral politics.
In a large swath cutting across the vast hinterland of the Indian subcontinent, rebels inspired by Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong have called for a boycott of the polls. The armed guerrillas always threaten to disrupt national elections; this year is no different.
The rebels are active in 20 of India’s 28 states, from Bihar in the east through central India, to the borders of the southernmost states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The rebels demand a greater share of wealth from the area’s natural resources and more jobs for farmers and the poor.
Nearly 10,000 people have been killed in rebel ambushes and gunbattles between police and rebels since 1979. Security, already tight in rebel areas, will be reinforced with even more troops to protect voters and electoral staff.
They only made a lone appearance in my paper before disappearing.
Similar boycotts are also expected in the violence-wracked northern state of Kashmir, where separatist groups have called on people to shun the elections. In the last parliamentary election in 2009, 40 percent of Kashmir’s eligible voters turned out despite rebels’ calls for boycotts and strikes.
So when does Kashmir get a vote for independence anyway?
The massive size of the electorate is its own unique challenge....
Many Indian states are so huge that elections have to be conducted in several phases to enable security forces to be moved around. In two states, elections will be held on six polling dates given their size and histories of violence.
In all, around 3 million paramilitary troops and police will be deployed to maintain law and order during the polls, officials said.
‘‘The unique thing about Indian elections is that huge numbers of people are voting,’’ said Bose, the political commentator. ‘‘And it’s the poorest who will make it a point to go out and vote. For this one time, people feel a sense of power. They feel they are relevant.’’
Yeah, ratifying the selected candidates of wealth and choosing one makes me feel real powerful.
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At least India doesn't have the illusion and imagery of U.S. politics....
"India’s opposition uses US-style tactics in bid to oust ruling party" by Annie Gowen | Washington Post April 08, 2014
NEW DELHI — One recent Sunday morning, volunteers for India’s main opposition party fanned out through a middle-class apartment building in the capital. They were knocking on doors, guided by the most sophisticated analytical voter data that India has ever seen.
When a sleepy young man at one door said he favored the party’s candidate for prime minister, Narendra Modi, the volunteers pounced.
‘‘Are you on Facebook? Twitter? Do you use WhatsApp to chat with friends?” asked Mahavir Mittal, 45, a shoe box manufacturer. “We would like to send out some political jokes, Modi messages, and videos. Can you post and circulate them among your friends?’’
On Monday, millions began heading to the polls in an election that could oust the party that has dominated India’s politics for decades and that could see voters move beyond traditional priorities such as caste and religion to focus on government corruption and the economy.
India’s electorate is starkly different today than a decade ago, when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s first coalition government came to power. About two-thirds of the population is younger than 35.
Voters are more urban and connected than ever before, and per capita income has risen dramatically. Upwardly mobile urban dwellers make up about one-third of the electorate.
To reach them, political parties are going beyond the traditional campaign rallies, packed with supporters bused in by candidates.
Now, they are pursuing US-style campaign strategies, including volunteer mobilization, social media outreach, and micro-targeting of various groups, such as business executives, students, and retirees living in gated communities.
The parties hope to engage members of India’s growing middle class who in previous elections stayed home instead of waiting in long lines at polling stations.
The tactics are also being used to reach India’s youth. The number of first-time voters has increased from 43 million in 2009 to 101 million, out of 814 million eligible voters, according to figures from the Election Commission of India.
With 814 million eligible voters, India will vote in stages over the next five weeks in a staggered approach made necessary by the country’s vast size. Voters will choose representatives for the 543-seat lower house of Parliament.
Results from all 935,000 polling stations are expected May 16. The opposition Bharatiya Janata Party and its candidate, Modi, are seen as the biggest threats to the governing Congress party.
In the past, Indian voters often cast ballots along caste, religious, or ethnic lines, sometimes following a village elder’s orders. That benefited the Congress party, which has a large presence in the countryside.
‘‘I am impatient. Some days I feel that our old-style politics and politicians will never change, but then there are days when I feel there is still some hope for India,’’ said Tavleen Kohli, 22, a graduate student of psychology in Gurgaon, a suburb of the capital.
Another campaign based on "hope?"
‘‘Jobs are important for me, but so is clean politics. In this election, many of my friends feel that our vote matters.’’
If you tell me that enough maybe I'll believe it. You don't have Diebold machines in India, do you?
Modi, 63, has 3.66 million followers on Twitter and has drawn more than a million volunteers to his campaign, a new development in a country where politicking has generally been done by party workers. The Bharatiya Janata Party is ahead in most polls.
Modi’s campaign highlights his record as the probusiness chief minister of the western state of Gujarat and plays down his credentials as an ardent Hindu nationalist.
Which won't be helping the causes of poverty and peace.
He is trying to capitalize on disillusionment with the current government over the slowdown in economic growth. The country’s gross domestic product grew at more than 4 percent in 2013, less than half of the increase in 2010.
I'll bet nothing really changes, either!
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Also see: Indian Tea Party
UPDATE:
"Indian Maoist rebels killed 14 people in two attacks in the central state of Chhattisgarh on Saturday as they continue a campaign aimed at disrupting a five-week national election. Five election officials and two bus drivers were killed when a land mine exploded under their vehicle in Bijapur district, where voting will occur next week, police said (AP)."
Something else that really hasn't changed:
"3 death sentences for India gang rape" by Mansi Choksi and Gardiner Harris | New York Times April 05, 2014
MUMBAI, India — Three men convicted of participating in a gang-rape of a Mumbai photojournalist last year were sentenced to death Friday under the strict provisions of a new rape law that have begun to cause unease among some women’s rights advocates.
The death sentences are the first imposed under a law passed last year amid nationwide protests that followed the gang-rape and murder in December 2012 of a student on a New Delhi bus....
Under the new law, repeat offenders must be sentenced to a minimum of life in prison, and may be given the death penalty....
The death penalty is rarely imposed and more rarely carried out in India, and even some advocates for women’s rights said Friday that they were uneasy that the men had been sentenced to die.
“I think these penalty provisions need to be reconsidered,” said Renuka Singh, a sociologist at Jawaharlal Nehru University. “The purpose is to reform these people, not eliminate them.”
Just goes to show you women are never happy no matter where they are or what you do. Must be an idiosyncrasy or something.
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Related: India's Red Brigade
