India’s final phase of voting for general elections to elect 543 members to the Lok Sabha for 57 of 543 seats is on June 1 including that of PM Narendra Modi. Balloting was completed for 486 seat thru last Monday in the previous six phases. There has been much interest in the elections by the Indian diaspora.
There was lower than usual turnout in the last six phases causing jittery among voters, analysts, and political parties. Polls projected an easy re-election of incumbent Prime Minister Narendra Mod and his ruling BJP which is the dominant partner of the National Democratic Alliance. However, the opposition Congress claims it will emerge victorious; Congress is the dominant partner of the INIDA bloc opposition alliance.
Will Modi win? Modi is on course to victory based on an analysis conducted by this writer after several trips there over the last few years. The question is number of seats BJP and NDA will win. Voters are rewarding Modi for performance over the last ten years becoming the PM in May 2014. This is his third stint contesting for the Lok Sabha having won from the holiest city of Varanasi in 2014 and 2019. Varanasi is over 5,000 years old — the world’s oldest continuous city with an ancient civilization. Varanasi has been transformed under Modi with modern buildings, highways, and other infrastructure. This writer fist spent time in Varanasi as a student in August 1985 and returned some two dozen times thereafter. Thousands of Guyanese visited the city annually going back for the last fifty years; many Guyanese also studied in Varanasi at the prestigious Benaras Hindu University. This writer was a guest lecturer at BHU and other colleges dozens of times. As this writer can attest, the holy city has been transformed with major developmental projects since first visiting in 1985 and from 2014. Since Modi was elected in May 2014, this writer visited Varanasi a dozen times, most recently in April and last February querying views about their parliamentary rep and the PM. Modi has consistently had very high approval ratings in his constituency and is expected to win by a huge margin. This writer polled constituents on Modi’s performance. Modi has been the best parliamentary rep of his constituency since elections were first held in the early 1950s, and in fact he has been the best rep of all constituencies over the last decade. He has been a fantastic rep bringing back memories of effective representation of MPs in Trinidad like Trevor Sudama in Oropouche, Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj in Couva South and Tabaquite, Chandresh Sharma of Fyzabad, Rushton Paray of Mayaro, among a few others.
There is keen interest among Indians in the diaspora in India’s elections. Indians globally want Modi to win so that he can continue the transformation of India that he began in 2014. India achieved record growth under Modi’s leadership. Guyana and the Caribbean cemented ties with India under Modi’s leadership. In addition, Guyana and the region received record benefits from India under Modi’s leadership. Thousands of Guyanese received scholarships to study in India under Modi’s generosity. India rushed assistance to Caribbean countries during the Covid 19 epidemic. India has been very generous with all kinds of assistance from health to loans to infrastructure to technology, among other areas.
I traveled around the Caribbean region and in USA, Canada, UK, France, Australia, New Zealand, Holland, Mauritius, Fiji, Trinidad, Suriname, St. Martin, Aruba, Antigua, Jamaica, Singapore, Malaysia, among other countries over the last eleven years. The journey started the year (2013) Modi was nominated as Prime Ministerial candidate for the BJP and the NDA. Everywhere I traveled, Indians were favorably disposed towards Modi, viewing him as the leader who restored national pride in their ancestral homeland. They love him. Modi has been mainly responsible for India becoming the fifth largest economy two years ago. Modi is aiming for India to become the third largest economy by 2027.
Modi is no stranger to Guyana having visited once in his private capacity, hosted by Ravi Dev and other prominent Indians in 2000, just before he became Chief Minister of Gujarat (2001 till 2014), He was to re-visit Guyana and Trinidad in November 2018 following a G-20 summit in Argentina but the trip was cancelled at the last minute because of the need to rush to Delhi for a political emergency. This writer has been lobbying for a Modi visit to the Caribbean (Trinidad, Guyana) for a summit with Caribbean leaders. It is hoped that it will happen in 2025 or 2026 if Modi wins re-election. Since Trinidad, Guyana, Suriname holds elections in 2025 with incumbents pre-occupied with re-election, a Modi visit is unlikely unless it takes place early 2025. It is possible for the PM to visit later this year when he attends the G20 in Brazil. The President of Guyana and other CARICOM leaders should invite the Indian PM for an official visit to strengthen relations with the region.