December 6, 2003	Saturday	Shawwal 11, 1424

NEW DELHI, Dec 5: India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday celebrated sweeping victories in three state assembly polls, while leaders of the defeated Congress party staged an inquiry into what had gone wrong.

Supporters of the BJP were shown on television dancing and setting off fireworks early into the morning in the streets of Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh and Rajasthan states.

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s BJP ousted Sonia Gandhi’s Congress in Monday’s assembly polls in the three states, doubling the number of states in India where it rules.

In Rajasthan, the BJP picked up 87 seats to secure a majority of 120 in the 200-seat assembly. Congress went down 96 seats to win just 57.

The BJP’s showing in Madhya Pradesh was even more impressive, picking up 91 seats to win 173 spots in the 230-member assembly. Congress lost 86 seats to finish with only 38 lawmakers.

But Congress easily retained Delhi, albeit with a majority cut by the BJP.

The extent of the victories in the three Hindi heartland states surprised even the BJP, which rules the country in coalition, but its leaders made it clear that they would not be tempted into early national parliamentary elections.

“There is no proposal to go for early (parliamentary) polls. They will be held as scheduled in Sept 2004,” BJP president M. Venkaiah Naidu told reporters on Friday in Chattisgarh’s capital, Raipur.

The state polls, seen as a barometer of next year’s vote, marked the most significant gains since the Hindu nationalists came to power in 1998.

Analysts noted the BJP this time stayed away from religiously divisive issues it used to great effect in the past such as the campaign to build a temple over the ruins of the Babri mosque.

Mr Naidu acknowledged right-wing Hindu causes were issues in the election but added: “The BJP’s commitment to the cause of the (Ayodhya) temple is unequivocal and it will never deviate from the path of Hindutva,” or the Hindu way of life.

The Indian media on Friday blamed Congress’ poor showing on typical aversion to an incumbent party, but they also fingered Sonia Gandhi’s leadership.

The Asian Age, whose main story was headlined “Congress wrecked, Sonia sunk”, said Congress leaders had admitted that they should have spent more time addressing development issues, particularly in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, India’s two largest states respectively in terms of area.

Sonia Gandhi had campaigned widely in both Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

Press reports said that while joyous BJP leaders in Delhi set off firecrackers when the final results were released on Thursday evening, Sonia Gandhi went into a meeting with her advisers to assess what had gone wrong.

“Overall, the election results, which must be read as a powerful verdict against Congress policies under the leadership of Sonia Gandhi, have dealt a brutal — possibly a fatal — blow to the ambitions of the Congress to form the next (national) government,” the Hindu newspaper said in an editorial.

The Times of India said the results were a “red signal warning for Sonia” and that her party was in “virtual disarray” after the polls.

“The Congress’s dilemma is that without Sonia Gandhi there is not just no recognisable leader, but that there is no recognisable party either,” it said.

During electioneering, the BJP played up the Italian origins of Sonia Gandhi.

Opinion polls have showed that as Mr Vajpayee’s popularity is soaring, Sonia’s is slipping to all-time lows.

With no apparent successor, however, analysts believe the Congress has no option but to go into next year’s parliamentary polls with Sonia at the helm.

—AFP