India 2022 assembly elections Feb/Mar and Nov/Dec

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https://www.indiatoday.in/elections/uttar-pradesh-assembly-polls-2022/story/voter-turnout-first-phase-3-percent-lower-2017-1911627-2022-02-11

"Voter turnout in first phase of UP polls 3% lower than in 2017 election

"The first phase of polling in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election was conducted on Thursday. According to the Election Commission, the voter turnout in the 58 constituencies that went to the polls in the first phase was 60.17 per cent. In the 2017 Assembly election, these same seats had registered a 64.56 per cent voter turnout.

This means that western Uttar Pradesh has registered a drop of three per cent in voter turnout in this Assembly election as compared to the previous one in 2017. In the 2012 Assembly election, won by the Samajwadi Party, 61.03 per cent voter turnout was recorded in the same 58 constituencies. In 2007, when BSP won, the voter turnout in these seats was only 48.26 per cent.
VOTING HIGHER IN 7 DISTRICTS

Out of the eleven districts that went to the polls in the first phase on Thursday, the voter turnout increased in seven districts and decreased in four in the 2022 Assembly election

The voter turnout increased in Baghpat, Bulandshahr, Hapur, Mathura, Meerut, Muzaffarnagar and Shamli but fell in Noida, Ghaziabad, Agra and Aligarh.
WHO WON THESE SEATS IN 2017?

In 2017, BJP won 53 of the 58 seats that went to the polls in the first phase on Thursday. Meanwhile, the Samajwadi Party won two, the BSP bagged another two and Rashtriya Lok Dal won one.

In the 2012 election, BJP had won only ten of the 58 seats while the SP got 14 and BSP won 20. The Congress had won four and RLD eight.

The BJP improved its tally in western UP by 43 seats between 2012 and 2017. On the other hand, the BSP lost 18 seats, the SP lost 12 and RLD lost seven.
DISTRICT-WISE SEAT DISTRIBUTION

At present, the BJP holds two out of the three seats in Shamli district that went to the polls in the first phase. The other seat is held by the SP.

Out of seven seats in Meerut, six are with the BJP and one with Samajwadi Party. In Baghpat district, the BJP won two seats while the RLD won one in 2017.

All seven seats in Bulandshahr, three in Noida, five in Ghaziabad, six in Muzaffarnagar, nine in Agra and seven in Aligarh are occupied by the BJP.

In Hapur, two seats were won by BJP and one by BSP in 2017. In Mathura, four out of five seats are with BJP and one with BSP."

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ADR report indicates that in Punjab 68% of SAD and 50% of AAP candidates have criminal records.

This chart highlights another fact.  The 2022 Punjab AAP is a very different formation than the 2017 Punjab AAP.  There has been a very high turnover in terms of AAP candidates from 2017 to 2022.  Part of it is because half of the 2017 AAP winners defected to INC.  But beyond that very few of 2017 AAP non-winners were nominated.  The 2017 AAP candidate list had a lot of activists many of which are youth or even student activists which were signs of AAP as an insurgent party. 

This time around AAP has a lot more local kingpins as indicated by the fact that 50% of AAP candidates have criminal backgrounds.  This is a positive signal for AAP to win.  A student activist insurgent party can win in a once in a long time anti-incumbency wave (like Delhi 2013) but to win in the long run you need to gather a coalition of lost vested interests along with a party cadre.   Candidate with a criminal background, even if it is violent (murder rape) and perhaps because it is violent, implies they have their own organization with a high level of control and influence in the local economic ecosystem.   AAP seems to be adopting the BSP model of getting second-tier local kingpins that can bring some local votes to add to the core AAP vote.  Such candidates add to the AAP core vote based on image and the AAP CM face and build a winning coalition.  All things equal 50% of the AAP candidates having a criminal background is a sign of the AAP transformation and is a fairly positive signal for AAP's chances of winning despite a theoretical candidate quality gap in terms of political expereince relative to INC and SAD.

That's a bit depressing considering the circumstances of AAP's founding.

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ADR report indicates that in Punjab 68% of SAD and 50% of AAP candidates have criminal records.

This chart highlights another fact.  The 2022 Punjab AAP is a very different formation than the 2017 Punjab AAP.  There has been a very high turnover in terms of AAP candidates from 2017 to 2022.  Part of it is because half of the 2017 AAP winners defected to INC.  But beyond that very few of 2017 AAP non-winners were nominated.  The 2017 AAP candidate list had a lot of activists many of which are youth or even student activists which were signs of AAP as an insurgent party. 

This time around AAP has a lot more local kingpins as indicated by the fact that 50% of AAP candidates have criminal backgrounds.  This is a positive signal for AAP to win.  A student activist insurgent party can win in a once in a long time anti-incumbency wave (like Delhi 2013) but to win in the long run you need to gather a coalition of lost vested interests along with a party cadre.   Candidate with a criminal background, even if it is violent (murder rape) and perhaps because it is violent, implies they have their own organization with a high level of control and influence in the local economic ecosystem.   AAP seems to be adopting the BSP model of getting second-tier local kingpins that can bring some local votes to add to the core AAP vote.  Such candidates add to the AAP core vote based on image and the AAP CM face and build a winning coalition.  All things equal 50% of the AAP candidates having a criminal background is a sign of the AAP transformation and is a fairly positive signal for AAP's chances of winning despite a theoretical candidate quality gap in terms of political expereince relative to INC and SAD.

That's a bit depressing considering the circumstances of AAP's founding.

But that is the only viable way for AAP to win in agriculture-heavy Punjab.  In more urbanized Delhi and Goa AAP has also abandoned the student activist candidates but has more non-criminal power brokers as their candidates.   The AAP still have their brand and core vote.  It is just not enough to win.

All true, but recruiting crimelords is pretty far from the purpose of the party at all. Some of Kejriwal's methods (freebies and religious appeals) are pretty base.

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After voting in Uttarakhand, 3 sitting BJP MLAs, 2 from fairly safe BJP seats, and one for a very BJP marginal seat have accused Uttarakhand BJP of having "traitors" that have sabotaged their campaigns. Most likely they sense after the vote that things are not going so well for the BJP.

Uttarakhand has been pretty anti incumbent in the past and the dip in turnout is probably also not a good sign for BJP.

https://thewire.in/politics/activists-blame-timing-of-polls-as-uttarakhand-sees-a-3-drop-in-voter-turnout

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https://www.livemint.com/news/india/dera-sacha-sauda-chief-gurmeet-ram-rahim-gets-21-day-furlough-from-jail-11644224206082.html

"Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim gets 21-day furlough from jail"

This is very fishy.  Dera Sacha Sauda(DSS) is a new age religion with tens of millions of followers in Punjab and Haryana mostly Dalits.   DSS historically backed INC but in 2017 shifted its support to BJP due to legal troubles related to its leader Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.  Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was facing rape and murder charges and eventually was convicted and now serving 2 life sentences.  When Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was convicted there were massive riots in Haryana and Punjab by DSS followers.

The nature of the rape charges for Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh is familiar to various Godmen in India.  It's all the same, at some point the Godman will demand young and sometimes underaged daughters of his followers have sexual relationships with him for religious reasons.  For Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh he went beyond that when he arranged to have some DSS defectors that exposed what he was doing murdered.

Anyway with Punjab elections coming up, it is fishy that Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh is being let out on parole for 21 days just in time for him to rally his DSS followers to vote BJP.

Apparently there has been a lodged dispute by an independent candidate. I am unsure of what might come of it other than Singh not being allowed any more furloughs.

[omar04]

On a smaller note, some articles on the hijab dispute in Karnataka.

https://theprint.in/india/the-politics-behind-karnatakas-hijab-row-sliding-congress-rising-sdpi-combative-bjp/827902/ (The author has published a few more recent articles on the same website).

https://www.daijiworld.com/news/newsDisplay?newsID=927884

https://www.thehansindia.com/karnataka/muslim-parties-behind-hijab-turmoil-udupi-mla-raghupathi-bhat-729879

https://www.deccanherald.com/state/karnataka-politics/hijab-row-sdpi-backing-bjp-alleges-congress-1082825.html

https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/bangalore/karnataka-bengaluru-hijab-row-live-updates-college-protests-high-court-hearing-covid-7779305/

The SDPI and BJP may be considered to be colluding to stir up religious sectarianism for their own benefits. Indeed, Congress accused SDPI of backing the BJP in this regard and escalating the issue from the university level. There have been some recent inroads made by SDPI in the state.

[omar04]

The dispute originally began with parents discovering students weren't allowed to wear hijab in classrooms and the CFI (student wing of the PFI which SDPI is the political wing of) siding with them prompting organizations opposed to them to join the fray. To be fair, this isn't a new trend, the CFI is growing more popular with Muslim students in Udupi where the college in question is located. The coastal districts of Karnataka which Udupi is one of are apparently known to have a lot of communal disputes.

AIMIM as far as I can tell has not played much of a direct role in the protests, I do recall their workers were putting up a few posters supporting hijab. But like you said, it's definitely impacted election conditions in UP with social media and whatnot.

I apologize if I sound condescending or anything, that's not my intention at all.

[omar04]

Priyanka Gandhi should be pretty embarrassed with her UP campaign losing all of Rae Bareli and Amethi and sliding to just two seats from seven. The INC has missed almost every opportunity for introspection after defeat so far.

https://www.republicworld.com/elections/punjab/election-results-2022-ashwani-kumar-says-congress-will-be-reduced-to-a-regional-outfit-articleshow.html

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I know it's two years early, but given the election results so far, does it look like the coalition behind Prime Minister Narendra Modi will win another landslide in 2024, and hold on for yet another five years?

https://www.hindustantimes.com/opinion/what-march-2022-says-about-may-2024-101647085619573.html

My personal opinion:

They will probably lose some ground relative to 2018 which was the first time a government was returned with an increased majority in India. The victory in UP is a good sign for them though as the state has a 1/7th of the national legislature's seats (they would have even more if the seats weren't allocated based on the 1971 census). Also, the opposition is quite divided which further benefits Modi.

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https://twitter.com/MilanV/status/1502743676908412930

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Upcoming byelection in West Bengal's Asansol LS constituency.

https://theprint.in/politics/in-fielding-outsider-shatrughan-sinha-for-asansol-bypoll-mamata-takes-a-lesson-from-bjp/876092/

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Likely map of next reapportionment in 2031.  The last reapportionment was in 1971 which was paused to encourage states to pursue birth control policies and not worry about losing political influence



The trend is clear.  Massive gains for Hindi states and big losses for Dravidian states.  Non-Hindi Indo-Aryan states also lose ground except for Gujarat.  Note that in Hindi states Upper caste heavy Uttarakhand and HP also lose ground which shows the Hindi state surge is mostly driven by OBC and Dalits. 

These numbers are very good news for BJP and very bad news for INC.  On the flip side, this assumes that post-Modi the BJP can continue its hold over Hindi OBC and Dalit voters and not revert back to a Hindi upper caste party.

 Note the biggest gains are in low-income states and the biggest losses are in high-income states.  This means after 2031 the median MP will be represented by a lower-income voter than before.  This means medium-term redistributive populist policies will continue to be the order of the day be it from BJP INC or some other formation.

LS could also be expanded after the seat freeze ends in 2026. Reportedly the new building will have 888 seats for the LS and 552 for the upper house.

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https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/nation/the-curious-case-of-aap-in-himachal-pradesh-and-gujarat-strategy-or-compulsion-448861

https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/nation/almost-missing-in-hp-aap-trying-to-make-inroads-in-guj-448669

[omar04]

Income/capita map by district for Southern India

Bengaluru and Hyderabad are high as expected. Kerela overall is high as expected.   Hyderabad being so high was the main driver for the Telangana movement where it was felt that the wealth of Hyderabad was being used for coastal AP and not for the Telangana region which Hyderabad is in theory part of.

I am surprised by how low Chennai is relative to other urban centers.  Coastal TN is low when compared to inland TN which is a surprise.  North Karnataka is low when compared to the more commercial South Karnataka.  Far East AP is more like Odisha which makes their levels low.

Chennai's white collar jobs are declining quantitatively and qualitatively although it's obviously more complex than that: https://www.reddit.com/r/Chennai/comments/w56ujh/is_tn_declining_overall/