Didi defeats Modi
The incumbent chief minister's party
in India's West Bengal state has defeated Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party
in a state election held as the coronavirus pandemic surged to crisis levels.
Modi has been criticised for
focusing on the elections instead of making the pandemic his top priority.
Some expert blame the federal
election commission for allowing rallies and voting in which large crowds
flouted rules on social distancing and mask-wearing.
Mamata Banerjee, 66, is set to be
the chief of West Bengal for the third time after her Trinamool Congress party
(TMC) won a two-thirds majority, taking more than 200 seats in the 294-seat
state assembly, election commission officials said. Final counting for some
seats was still underway.
Banerjee is now India's only woman
chief minister.
Despite the defeat, Modi's Bharatiya
Janata Party(BJP) made substantial gains, making it the main opposition party
as its tally in the state legislature went to nearly 80 seats from just three
seats won in 2016.
Modi, his colleagues and regional
politicians campaigned aggressively in five state elections despite the
pandemic. The results are seen as a test of the impact the pandemic's second
wave is having on support for him and his right-wing BJP.
Banerjee, a sharp critic of Modi,
largely conducted a one-woman campaign to retain power by leading scores of
public rallies.
"It is a stupendous performance
by Mamata Banerjee because Modi was determined to win Bengal, but it's clear
that his entire political machinery and strategy was unable to defeat
her," said Diptendu Bhaskar, a political analyst in Kolkata, West Bengal's
capital.
In Assam state, the BJP managed to
retain political power. In Tamil Nadu, the DMK - the main regional opposition
party - secured victory
In Kerala state, the ruling lefist
political party was set to form government while the BJP led-alliance won no
seats. In the union territory of Puducherry, the All India NR Congress-led
alliance was leading in 14 of the 30 seats assembly.
Most of the votes were cast in
March, but polling in some constituencies continued through April, just as
India started to detect thousands of new coronavirus infections everyday.