 Hello and welcome to People's Dispatch. The Indian elections have just concluded and the results have been declared with the far-right Bharatiya Janata Party coming back into power with a majority of seats in the parliament. So today we have with us Prashant to discuss and analyze the results of this election. Hi Prashant. So can you, to start with, can you talk about the general voting patterns that were seen in these elections, what sections of the population preferred which party and also which regions of India voted for which party? So to give a quick, take a quick look at the numbers. So this is, 900 million people were eligible to vote in India this time for the 2019 parliamentary polls and nearly 67.1% people voted, which is almost a record. And the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party like you pointed out, the BJP, it secured 303 seats of its own for the 542 seats for which the elections were held. And its allies together got another 40, 42 seats more. So the right-wing alliance ends up with around 345 seats in the 542 member parliament. And the important thing to note is that last time, this is a much bigger margin than last time. So for last time, the BJP had 282. So now it's 300 seats, 21 seat increase. And the main opposition party, the Indian National Congress, got 52 seats. And that's again a slight increase from last time where it had 44. So if you look at the regions where some of these votes have taken place, we see that in the northern belt, the BJP has almost completely swept. So almost whole belt starting from the north to say Karnataka, the province of Karnataka in the south. The BJP almost completely swept many of these regions. And also in the state of West Bengal to the east, we see again that there has been a considerable improvement in the BJP's fortunes. So this is the basic, these are the basic numbers. And this campaign was marked by, this campaign had many unique features. It was one of the most religiously charged campaigns in recent history in India. The BJP ran a campaign which was very strongly communal in the religious sense of the term. And there was a lot of emphasis on national security. There was a lot of emphasis on national pride. And that to a very right-wing sort. So just before the elections, the Indian Air Force had what do you call, mounted attacks on Pakistan. And this was used specifically by the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi and other BJP leaders as a campaign plank. So this was definitely a election which was, can we shall we say, it was very acrimonious campaign. There was a lot of hate that was openly displayed during this campaign. And it was a campaign which was run on a very majoritarian line, so to speak. So there was a very strong emphasis on what we can maybe call sectarian nationalism. And this coincides with similar movements across the world, as you've seen. So that explains to a large extent the victories in the Northern belt, for instance. And one of the interesting things is that, for instance, in a state like Madhya Pradesh or Rajasthan, that even just a few months ago, the BJP had been defeated in the local elections. They were able to come back with a massive margin in the national elections. So it does point to the fact that despite the government not performing on many indices, despite unemployment being high, despite farmers facing a lot of issues, the kind of campaign that was mounted on a very aggressive, macho, personality-based right-wing campaign does seem to have clicked in many parts of the country. So that is probably the first reading that we get out of this. So as you pointed out, despite farmers' issues, the agrarian crisis, despite unemployment being at a 45-year high and a lot of workers' issues as well, a lot of public companies, a lot of disinvestment in public companies, the BJP was able to come back. And you pointed out some of the reasons of how they managed to do it. Can you talk about how, why these sections of the population ignored their issues and still went to a party, which in all these years did not really work for them, despite promising to do so. These issues were more or less ignored in the mainstream media for a long time. But in the past couple of months, we saw that even the mainstream media was picking up on these things a bit. But despite that, these sections of the population do not seem to have thought along these lines. Well, I think there are a couple of angles to it. One, for instance, it's interesting to note that as far as the far-right BJP is concerned or Prime Minister Narendra Modi is concerned, this was not an election campaign that was run with promises of policy promises. So there was very little policy promises in any of these areas. So this was definitely a campaign run on slogans and a particular emotional wave, so to speak. And that played a considerable role in the way people voted. For instance, there was a lot of sentiment of national pride, which people believed that had been increased because of the government. That definitely played a factor. And we also had to look at the fact that there are a lot of schemes which the government had announced, which were maybe connected, which were continuations of schemes from previous governments, were very powerful campaign associated directly with the Prime Minister. And so, because it was such a personality-driven campaign, India doesn't have a presidential form of government. It has a parliamentary form of government. But this campaign was run very much on presidential lines. And so the Prime Minister Narendra Modi was identified as a man who had done X, Y, Z, although if you look at it historically, these schemes were, many of them were just continuations of previous schemes. So in those senses, people, many voters, especially in the northern states, had a particular identification with the, also although, so it is not a vote for a party. It is not a vote for necessarily even a government. It is a vote for one person. And this was also called, there is also the whole history of Narendra Modi and the BJP being part of a larger project of the Rajshriya Swamsevak Sangh, the RSS. And the RSS is a social organization which has a very violent history of mobilizing on religious terms. So there is also this project to build a Hindu country because of the understanding that India is, India is supposed to be a homeland for the Hindus and others are foreigners. So there was a lot of mobilization happening on those lines. Similarly, there was a lot of mobilization happening on the lines of caste as well. So for instance, there was a different invocation of caste, especially considering that many of the opposition parties often represented sections of the oppressed caste. So there was definitely a mobilization on the grounds of caste as well. So all these factors combined together to, and worked together in various ways to ensure that the northern states, especially and many states in the south and the east also, there was a substantial, for instance, in the state of West Bengal, which does not so much have a history of, in the recent times, in the last 30, 40 years, not so much a history of religious violence. There was a very powerful concerted effort by the BJP to increase tensions on religious lines. So those are all factors that actually work together in various ways to push it. And one of the important things we must remember is that there's a lot of focus placed on the fact that this, a lot of analysts have already begun saying that this is a sign of India coming out of say, various identities to become one identity, so to speak. And this vote, for instance, is a sign. Many analysts have been saying that. On the other hand, we must remember that this so-called identity is not an inclusive identity. It is a one, it's a majoritarian identity. It's one built on exclusion on the idea that on a very right-wing idea, which we see in many parts of the world, whether it be Donald Trump in the US, whether it be the Eastern European countries where a particular form of nationalism is rising. So this election actually sees a continuation of many of these forms. And looking at all these different mobilizations that occurred during the last five years, and the work the left did in mobilizing and organizing people, be it on farmers issues, workers issues, gender issues, and even oppressed sections, oppressed castes, Dalits. All of this was happening. All of these people were coming together from different parts of the country and raising various demands, which were many times against the government that was in power, against BJP. So what happened that these mobilizations and this sort of messaging was not able to convert into votes, not just for the left, but even for other opposition parties? So in the sense that if you look at this campaign specifically, the reason the BJP scams, and one other important thing to notice that possibly this is the most expensive election in India so far, and the BJP was able to throw in money at a rate no other party could even equal. And it was not just money being thrown in, it was also a very sophisticated exercise of data gathering, of fine-tuned campaigning, for instance, a kind of stuff Cambridge Analytica specialized in, at a much larger scale that the BJP has been indulging in. So I wouldn't say that the mobilizations of the past many years have completely failed on these counts because in many places where these mobilizations took place, for instance, in Maharashtra where there was a massive farmers movement, the candidate of the left did win a considerable number of votes. Similarly in Rajasthan also, there was a different, definite increase in some of those votes as far as, say, the voting was concerned. Similarly in the south if you look, the region where Kerala and Tamil Nadu, the two provinces in the south, there was a very strong definite anti-BJP vote and these are places again where they have been very strong mobilizations against the BJP. So I would say that many of these mobilizations, the impact might take some more time to be felt and there was some amount of impact, but the larger extent to which the narratives of the right were able to percolate, neutralize some of the elements of this opposition is the conclusion we can make for now. It would require a deeper study into seeing what is the extent in which various constituencies, the impact was felt. But the broader understanding right now would be that there was definitely, these narratives actually were able to succeed in influencing people to think that Modi might, Modi should get one more chance and that basically he is the person they identify with certain elements of national pride. And looking at left bastions such as Kerala and Tripura where left has been in power or has held a considerable stronghold. Since independence or even before independence left has been very strong. But in Kerala and even these other places there was a massive drop in the amount of votes they could get, the amount of support they could get. So what were the issues particularly particularly let's say in Kerala where there were certain like the temple movement and other things, what were the issues that led to this change? So it would be better to take each incident separately. For instance in the state of Kerala where a left government is currently ruling, there was a mass movement a couple of months ago of women against the temple, against the custom that they were not allowed to enter the temple. And this provided, this was obviously met with a certain amount of pushback from the other sections of society who were uncomfortable with these rituals being challenged. The important thing to note however here is that the BJP which was in the forefront of this campaign, this anti-woman campaign did not really benefit much from these elections. So while the left would not get the seats per se, the seats did not go to the BJP either. So it went to the centrist party who people maybe saw in many areas as a better national level player to fight the BJP. So the state of Kerala of the 20 seats, the BJP, right wing BJP has not got even one and they were completely whitewashed and everyone was predicting that they're going to benefit majorly from the selections, it didn't happen. So while the left was not per se able to benefit, the nature of the campaign it did was able to push a large section of the voters against the BJP. Now of course it is true that some sections of the people voted against the left because of this religious reason, so we can't entirely deny it. But the left has taken a very principled stand on this matter that social reform is as important or more important than political victory. So that's definitely one aspect. In certain, in many other places also there are two angles to it. One, the left has been facing a sustained attack on its cadre, on its support base by various political parties, especially in Tripura and Bengal and that reflected in the decrease of its support. But nonetheless it also definitely shows that the left really has a lot of challenges to, a lot of challenges ahead of it in terms of how to convert the membership of its mass movements into a voting, into a solid voting bloc. And that's a big question the left has to think about. One of the advantages of this election was that there was an unprecedented amount of left unity. So various political parties in the left came together, they fought on a common platform, there was a larger amount of synergy between them. So that's definitely a positive thing. But there remains a big challenge in terms of how you're able to beat the right-wing narratives that are there and the right-wing policies and convert people who are unhappy with it and who will come out onto the streets to march against them into voters for the left. So that's been a challenge for quite some time and I think this election puts that in more of a, it's in the sharper contrast becomes much more. And lastly, with another term for the far-right Bhartya Chanda Party, we can expect a lot more issues, a lot more communal divisions and these things to come up. So what would be, what are the sort of mobilizations we can expect from the left in the future? And what is the future for the left and somebody will question the relevance of the left now with, you know, being diminished to such a level in the parliament? Well, I think one key point about the left is that unlike many other political parties, its existence is not only predicated on its presence in parliament. So, and at this point of time, this is very important to remember because what the right-wing government is going to do in the next couple of years, you can list out a series of things. One, there is going to be a massive attack on the minorities, which means your press castes, the Muslims, the Christians, the people from indigenous backgrounds. So there's going to be a massive attack on their livelihoods and their lives. There is going to be a massive attack on the institutions of the country itself, the constitution's institutions, Supreme Court, the election commission, state governments. So what the, this government, this government is going to become bolder because of its mandate and push forward some of those assaults. There is going to be a subversion of many institutions to push this agenda of what is called Hindutva, that is a particular brand of nationalism based on exclusion. So there will be attempts to push more of people of this ideology into key positions in power, of key positions in the structure. There's definitely going to be intensification of the right-wing economic policy framework. So more disinvestment, cutting of funding for key sectors, both at a state level, provincial level and at national level, so that's definitely going to happen. So all these are fronts where massive fightbacks are going to be required and this basically makes the left more relevant than at any other point maybe because from the very beginning we've all been mentioning that this is a historic important election and this calls for those kinds of struggles which are relentless, which are continuous, which continue to inspire people and make more people aware of the fact that this party, this far-right party, this far-right government is actually eating into the very fundamentals of the country and its institutions. So the challenge for the left is fundamentally to do that and I am very sure that it will by bringing more and more people, forming more alliances of the marginalized, of the oppressed and coming together and fighting this far-right idea that India belongs to only one religion or one or a upper caste segment of one religion and their ideology is India's ideology. So the left will have to be and it will be in the forefront of that fight. So thank you Prashant for joining us today and thank you for watching People's Dispatch.