The largest election in human history is wrapping up
Just thought I'd report in from India.
We hired a driver when we moved here because the prospect of driving left-handed stick shift in Mumbai traffic is more than we really want to deal with. He asked me to help him unload something he got from the store today so I went to his apartment with him and helped him. It was a TV.
I laughed at him a little because of an earlier conversation we had where he had said that TV is bad because it would distract him from prayers (he's Muslim, a Hajji, in fact). "Dada! I thought you said that was haram!" ("Dada" means "older brother"
. He laughed too and then said, still laughing, "Yes, but I get a TV set every time there's an election. That way, if there are riots against Muslims, I'll know when I have to leave town." He was laughing, but not kidding. So there's that.
The big figure this election is Narendra Modi of the BJP. It's a very far-right coalition of northern Indian ethnic parties. (Far right socially; there's not really any such thing as an economic "right" in India, where a majority of provinces are still explicitly communist). The current government is the Congress party (Gandhi's and Nehru's party, if you go back far enough), but at this point corruption has bled away their normally solid support; their electoral strategy now seems to be to get basically 100% of the Muslim vote and enough southern Hindus to block BJP. BJP's strongholds are in the North and West, and they are allied with regional right-wing parties like, in Mumbai, the Shiv Sena (a Marathi nationalist party whose leader -- without being asked -- reminded the public last week that Shiv Sena does not rule out political violence "in self-defense" if the election goes against them).
There's some pretty big news today that an arrest warrant has been issued for one of Modi's spokesmen for saying that people who don't like the BJP can "go back to Pakistan". It's only "funny" because when Modi appointed him earlier this year he "issued an apology in advance", which I thought took some chutzpah.
One the one hand, Modi and the BJP in general are blamed for the horrific 2002 Gujarat riots, and have never apologized for inciting violence before them (excuse me, "communal self-defense" . And, when asked if he felt bad about the 1000+ muslims who were killed, he said "it's like when a dog dies; a Hindu feels empathy for all life." 
On the other hand, the Supreme Court inquiry (which was hardly stacked with Modi supporters) cleared him of direct responsibility, and it's not exactly like Congress has a riot-free history either.
Modi is running on his "Gujarat Miracle" (yes, it does sound a lot like Rick Perry, and the two actually have a disturbing amount in common). And, just like Perry's claim, Modi's has a tendency to dissipate whenever economists try to look at the actual data.
Anyways, the election is carried out over a few weeks (800 million voters and all) but tomorrow is the last "big" voting day; the more isolated districts will report by May 12. There have also been enough BJP returns for Modi to file his candidacy for Prime Minister (you only vote for your Lower House representative; the Upper House and Prime Minister are assigned based on the numbers from the Lower House), which I believe he's doing either today or tomorrow. Rahul Gandhi (the Congress candidate) will need to wait at least another week. The returns so far are interesting; BJP is doing worse than people predicted in the north and better than people predicted in the south. Meanwhile, the Aam Admi ("common man" pro-reform centrist party seems to be having a good enough showing that it can become a national party next election (this would be good in that a lot of the BJP's vote is disaffection with entrenched corruption, not really a right-wing social vote).
So, keep your eyes on the news from here; things could get interesting. If the returns to date hold out, BJP won't have a majority, which means Congress may scrape together enough votes for a coalition government, but historically those don't last very long, so we may be doing this all over again (or, Congress may fail to pick up enough partners, in which case it goes to a first past the post runoff).
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