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It’s time for a look at India’s elections. Tunku Varadarajan is first.
When Barack Obama was made aware that Narendra Modi would be India’s next prime minister, the chances are that he moaned softly to himself…and cringed.
India’s voters had brought to power a man who is not permitted to visit the United States, having been denied a U.S. visa in 2005 on account of a State Department determination that he had violated religious freedoms in the Indian state of Gujarat. (Some 2,000 Muslims had died in riots that scarred Gujarat in 2002. Modi was the state’s chief minister at the time, and his critics hold him responsible for the deaths.) The visa ban was still in place when Modi was nominated last September to lead theBharatiya Janata [Indian People’s] Party into the elections; and most awkwardly for Obama, the ban was still technically in place on the day of his victory. American diplomacy has been decidedly maladroit.
As if jolted awake by the obtuseness of his own State Department, Obama invited Modi to visit the U.S. “at a mutually agreeable time” when he called the Indian on Saturday to congratulate him on his triumph.
A meeting between the two men, when it occurs, could be fascinating to observe. Obama and Modi are from two different planets, and each, in his heart, is likely to have vigorous contempt for the other. The former is an exquisitely calibrated product of American liberalism, ever attentive to such notions as “inclusiveness.” He is the acme of political correctness (notwithstanding the odd drone directed at “AfPak”). Modi, by contrast, is a blunt-spoken nationalist, opposed to welfare, and to the “appeasement” of minorities. …
With a bit of hyperbole, Kevin Williamson calls Modi the “leader of the free world” and has a nice send off for Manhohan Singh.
… as Manmohan Singh steps off the stage, take a moment to appreciate what he managed. Political careers end either in death or disappointment, and Dr. Singh’s is no different — the corruption and incompetence that his government slid into in its last years brought India to a virtual standstill. But before that, his policies, from his time as finance minister forward, were the proximate cause of hundreds of millions of people rising out of poverty. There are very few world leaders who can say as much, and Nobel prizes have been awarded for less — much, much less, within recent memory. …
WSJ Editors celebrate the election.
… Mr. Modi’s record offers reason for optimism. As governor for 13 years of Gujarat state, he was the archetypal energetic executive, forcing through approvals of new projects and welcoming foreign investment. Gujarat now accounts for 25% of India’s exports, and the poverty rate has plunged. As the son of a tea-seller, Mr. Modi also has a gut sense of the economic aspirations of ordinary Indians.
That’s more than can be said for the losing Congress Party. Under Sonia Gandhi —scion of the family that has ruled India for the better part of its 67 years—Congress reverted to its old political strategy of doling out benefits to the poor and discouraging foreign investment. The result was growth below 5%, which to most Indians felt like a recession. With a work force growing by 12 million a year but only two million new jobs being created, it effectively was.
The best news from the BJP’s landslide is that welfare-state promises didn’t work with Indians who began to taste the fruits of reform and faster growth in the 1990s and 2000s. The country’s burgeoning middle class has been exposed to the broader world and wants more opportunities. Mr. Modi appealed to this new class of Indians in his campaign. He emphasized the difference between an older generation who died “for independence” and a younger India that “will live for good governance.” …
More from the Christian Science Monitor.
Right-wing Hindu nationalist Narendra Modi swept to power in a historic landslide victory in Indian elections, official results released on Friday showed.
Mr. Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won an outright victory, the first single party to do so for 30 years, with at least 279 of the 543 parliament seats up for grabs. The ruling Congress party, which has dominated Indian politics for the last 65 years under the Gandhi family, was humiliated, reduced to its worst showing ever.
The results were a stunning personal triumph for Modi, who ran a presidential-style election campaign promising development and economic growth that would bring jobs and services after several years of slowing growth and nearly double-digit inflation.
“This is the end of the ice age in Indian politics,” BJP spokesman Sambit Para told CNN-IBN TV.
“This is a huge meltdown for Congress,” agreed Yashwant Deshmukh, a pollster and political analyst. “The BJP has replaced Congress across the country as the dominant national party.”
Indian stock markets hit record highs on news of Modi’s victory, and the rupee rose on currency markets. Outgoing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh congratulated Modi; he will resign tomorrow. …
And Kevin Williamson with another note of optimism.
The loser was Rahul Gandhi. The Gandhi political dynasty descends not from Mohandas K. Gandhi, who is not related, but from India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, whose daughter, Indira Gandhi, served as prime minister, and was succeeded by her son, Rajiv. Rajiv’s wife, Sonia, became head of the Congress party, and Rahul is her son. A member of the family occupied the Indian premiership for 40 of the country’s first 60 years of independence.
I note the defeat of the Gandhi scion mainly to hearten those who fear that the 2016 U.S. presidential ballot will read “Bush/Clinton.” Dynasties are not invincible.
Faux commencement address from P. J. O’Rourke delivered to Rutgers, the university that kicked Condi to the curb.
Here Is What I Would Tell the Rutgers Graduating Class of 2014…
I hear Condoleezza Rice stood you up. You may think it was because about 50 students—.09 percent of your student body—held a “sit-in” at the university president’s office to protest the selection of Secretary Rice as commencement speaker. You may think it was because a few of your faculty—stale flakes from the crust of the turkey pot pie that was the New Left—threatened a “teach-in” to protest the selection of Secretary Rice.
“Sit-in”? “Teach-in”? What century is this?
I think Secretary Rice forgot she had a yoga session scheduled for today.
It’s shame she was busy. You might have heard something useful from a person who grew up poor in Jim Crow Alabama. Who lost a friend and playmate in 1963 when white supremacists bombed Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. Who became an accomplished concert pianist before she tuned her ear to the more dissonant chords of international relations.
Secretary Rice was Phi Beta Kappa at the University of Denver and received a B.A. cum laude in political science—back before the worst grade a student had ever heard of was a B-.
The professor who influenced her most was Josef Korbel, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s father.
Secretary Albright and Secretary Rice don’t agree on much about international relations. But they don’t sit-in or teach-in at each other’s public appearances.
Secretary Rice got a master’s in political science from Notre Dame, a Ph.D. in political science from Denver and, in the meantime, was an intern at the Carter administration State Department and the Rand Corporation and studied Russian at Moscow State University.
She rose from assistant professor to provost at Stanford. (Ranked fifth-best university in America by U.S. News & World Report. You’re ranked 69th.) While she was doing that, she also served, from 1989 to 1991, as the Soviet expert on the White House National Security Council under President George H. W. Bush. …
Late night humor from Andrew Malcolm.
SethMeyers: A new study claims that one-in-10 Americans no longer carries cash. They’re called ‘English majors.’
Conan: There is now an app that will choose something random for you to watch on Netflix. The app is called ‘Your Girlfriend.’
Fallon: A Texas town plans to recycle toilet water and use it for drinking water. Dogs said, “How are you only thinking of this now?”