About the Book
This empirically rich volume presents a holistic picture of the electoral process in Indian states and the return of the BJP to power. Drawing on the 2019 elections, it presents ground-level data to understand various aspects of elections: the nature of campaigning, caste, class and identity politics, electoral issues, poll strategies of different parties in the fray, electoral issues, electoral verdicts, the contestants, the leadership factor, the formation of government, among other empirical details. The essays underline the determinants of electoral behaviour by looking into the correlation between the background variables of voters and their voting choices. The essays also compare and contrast the 2019 election verdicts from the earlier elections held in the state under study.
A long view of Indian state politics, this book will be essential reference for scholars and researchers of politics, especially political processes, and South Asian studies.
Table of Contents:
1. The 2019 Lok Sabha Verdict at the State Level: An Introduction PART I: Northern States 2. Explaining the Two Delhi Verdicts in Comparative Perspective: Party Identification, Leadership and Welfare 3. The Congress Win in Punjab: An Outlier in the North 4. Continuity and Change in Haryana Politics: Lok Sabha and Assembly Elections, 2019 5. BJP’s Clean Sweep with Record Margin left the Congress Clueless in Himachal 6. Bharatiya Janata Party Victory in Uttar Pradesh: A Shift from Caste Based Politics 7. Electoral Politics in a Hill State: 2019 Elections in Uttarakhand PART II: Central States 8. Madhya Pradesh: Continued Ascendance of the Bharatiya Janata Party 9. Decoding the Sweeping BJP Victory in Rajasthan 10. What Sealed BJP’s Victory in Chhattisgarh? PART III: Western States 11. Maharashtra: BJP replaces Congress 12. Gujarat: Caste, Religion and Political Leadearship 13. Goa: BJP’s Electoral Slide but Political Triumph PART IV: Eastern States 14. Bihar: A Comprehensive Victory for the NDA 15. ‘Jai Bangla’ and ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’: Explaining the Emerging Political Dynamics in West Bengal 16. Odisha Dual Verdict: Leadership, Welfare and Hindutva 17. Jharkhand: The Ascendance of the BJP as a Dominant Party PART V: Southern States 18. Its Lone Southern Comfort – Lotus Blooms in Karnataka 19. Andhra Pradesh: Dominant Caste Cleavages, Continuities and Reflections 20. Kerala: Explaining the Dominance of UDF 21. Verdict 2019: Reinforcing Dravidian Identity Politics in Tamil Nadu 22. Springing a Surprise: Electoral Politics in the State of Telangana PART VI: North Eastern States 23. Voting Pattern in the North East: Special Focus on Nagaland, Meghalaya & Manipur 24. Assam: Saffron Persists in an Ethnic Setting
About the Author :
Sandeep Shastri is the Vice Chancellor of Jagran Lakecity University, India, and the National Coordinator of the Lokniti Network. As a founder member of Lokniti, he has been actively involved in all its activities for the last quarter century. He has been a UNDP Consultant, a World Bank Adviser, and a Senior Adviser to the Forum of Federations.
Ashutosh Kumar is Professor at the Department of Political Science, Panjab University, Chandigarh, India. He has been associated with the Lokniti Network, CSDS, Delhi, India as state coordinator for Punjab. His research centers around state politics, with a focus on the issues related to elections, identities, and development.
Yatindra Singh Sisodia is Professor and Director at M.P. Institute of Social Science Research, Ujjain, India (an ICSSR institute), and State Coordinator (Madhya Pradesh), Lokniti Network. His areas of interest are democracy, decentralised governance, electoral politics, tribal issues, and developmental issues. He has been conferred with Professor G. Ram Reddy Social Scientist Award (2017).
Review :
"This is a careful, data-based analysis of the 2019 state level electoral results. The contributors provide thoughtful, granular and insightful analyses to explain the variation in electoral outcomes across the states that went to the polls. Any scholar or analyst interested in state-level politics in India will benefit from a careful perusal of this book."
- Šumit Ganguly, Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Tagore Chair in Indian Cultures and Civilizations, Indiana University, Bloomington, USA
"Looking beyond the saffron wave, this book analyses the 2019 Lok Sabha elections in a systematic manner at the state level. This approach allows the author to restore India’s political diversity by relying on the unmatched richness of the CSDS-Lokniti National Election Survey. Not only the singularity of the non-BJP states is explained, but the contrast between state politics and national politics in the strongholds of Moditva are deciphered too. A must-read!"
- Christophe Jafferlote, King's India Institute, London, UK
"Empirically rich and theoretically engaging, Electoral Dynamics in the States of India, is a must read for anyone interested in Indian elections and party politics. Each chapter offers a comprehensive and data rich analysis of the verdict in the 2019 national elections. The book is impressive in its geographic coverage. Electoral Dynamics in the States of India distills the complex and variegated nature Indian elections into a clear and readable analysis, which should appeal to all readers."
- Pradeep Chhibber, Professor and Indo-American Community Chair in India Studies, UC Berkeley, USA
"The period from 2014 to 2019 is a ‘critical juncture’ in Indian politics when BJP’s hegemony consolidated and expanded across India despite some setbacks. Despite this centralism and establishment of what appears to be another “one-party dominant system,” this volume of state-level analysis of the 2019 national election reveals fascinating regional patterns of voting behaviors, as well as how the state-level party systems are evolving. It shows the deeper sources of BJP’s consolidation and how the emergence of a hegemonic dominant party system is built brick-by-brick across states and where it faces some resistance. Such a deep yet comprehensive dive into each state’s electoral and political life is indispensable for understanding the national picture. This book will become a valuable source material for scholars interested in India’s electoral and party politics, state-level politics and consolidation of Hindu nationalism."
- Aseema Sinha, Wagener Professor of Comparative and South Asian Politics, and Roberts Fellow, Claremont Mckenna College, USA
