The Congress should justifiably be happy with what it has achieved at the general elections. With what are truly its best results since 1991, the party is once more poised, with its likely coalition partners, to form the next government in India and thereby carry forward the process of continuity in policy. If continuity is the outcome of the elections, there is equally the matter of stability that has been given importance by the electorate. India’s voters have made it clear that they are keen about continuing on the road down which the Congress and the alliance it has headed in the last five years have taken India. Beyond and above that, the results of the elections are a patent pointer to the preference of a majority of Indians for a secular political order in the country, especially when it is perceived to be under threat from illiberal elements. That is certainly the most significant truth emerging from the voting.

The elections have meant a mauling for the communalistic Bharatiya Janata Party, which had confidently pinned its hopes on L.K. Advani assuming the office of the country’s prime minister. Indeed, the BJP’s shock at the drubbing it has had from the voters can clearly be compared with the shock it went through in 2004, when despite its ‘India Shining’ propaganda it saw itself voted out of office. This second defeat in a row demoralises the party and its allies to no end. It was unable to convince voters that national security after the Mumbai tragedy would be better handled by it in government. If that is the truth about the BJP, there is the bigger agony of losing to Mamata Bannerjee and the Congress in West Bengal that the Left must now contend with. It was not only a combination of forces between Trinamul and Congress that turfed out the CPI(M) and its fellow leftists. There is also the fact that the Left, having been in power in the state for more than three decades, was seen to be suffering from incumbency fatigue and clearly had little of new vision to offer. Of course, the Lok Sabha poll results do not push it out of office in Kolkata, but they do indicate the level of disillusionment voters feel with the state government.

The Indian elections take Sonia Gandhi up a good many notches more where national appeal as a political leader is concerned. At the same time, they are also a triumph for her son Rahul, whose focused and energetic campaigning throughout the country has brightened his chances of a national leadership role in the future. The elections have also thrown up a plethora of new faces in the form of movie idols. A new dimension has thus been added to politics with the entry of such individuals as Shatabdi Roy, Kabir Suman, Tapash Pal and Jayaprada.