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India poll results lift ruling Congress: analysts
AFP - 2 hours 18 minutes ago
NEW DELHI (AFP) - - India's ruling Congress party received a boost with its solid showing in recent state polls despite terror attacks and economic woes, as general elections loom next year, analysts said Tuesday.
India's oldest political party went into the five-state polls braced for a voter backlash because of spiralling inflation, a slowing economy and security concerns after the Mumbai terror attacks.
It was pitted against the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which was buoyed by a series of state poll wins against the Congress last year.
But Monday's results showed the Congress had secured outright wins in Delhi and northeastern Mizoram state as well as grabbing the desert state of Rajasthan from the BJP.
With the BJP retaining the states of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, many newspapers praised voters for rejecting partisan solutions to terrorism and the economic downturn.
"(Voters) recognise terrorism, especially the kind witnessed in Mumbai, as a war waged on the nation. During war, people rally around the government to fight the threat from outside," the Times of India said in its editorial.
"The Congress can heave a huge sigh of relief... It may be time for the BJP to go back to the drawing board."
Both Rajasthan and Delhi went to the polls after the Mumbai carnage and both voted for Congress, which has held national power most years since leading India's campaign for independence in 1947.
"The verdict shows that a large section of India recognises the need for a calm response (to terror)," political analyst Rasheed Kidwai told AFP.
"It also shows the people appreciate the way the government has handled the economic crisis, that they understand it is a global problem."
Analyst Pratap Bhanu Mehta agreed, saying that "the electorate had rejected the unthinking politics of polarisation and hysteria," while he described the Congress gains as "a significant victory."
"Even if terrorism and security are the issues, the Indian electorate has realised that real institutional reform rather than decades' old rhetoric is the way to tackle it," he told AFP.
Mehta warned that both parties "were on notice" in spite of Monday's verdict.
"It would be hazardous indeed to draw large and confident conclusions about national trends," he said referring to general elections that must be held by May next year.
The BJP came to power for the first time nationally in 1998, but unexpectedly lost out to Congress in 2004. The party has since been hit by internal power struggles.
The Hindu daily on Tuesday argued that people had voted on the basis of longstanding livelihood concerns and local issues "and not in a panic attack" after Mumbai.
"The real message voters have sent out is, in balance, a reassuring one: elections are not single-issue affairs, no matter what the propaganda of those who claim to be riding this or that emotional wave," it said.
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