-Economic and Political Weekly   What explains the erosion of support for the ruling combine at a time of rising human development indices? Ten years is long enough for an elected government to lose public faith and the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) has done much, both in acts of omission and commission, to ensure a steady erosion of support among the electorate. Large-scale corruption, the incompetence of the government in handling many important...

-The Hindu     The fact that education matters only in the long run makes it uninteresting for political parties. But in this election, the voice of education can be heard No matter how categorically a party or candidate might comment on them, the problems of education cannot compete with those of water and electricity supply or the condition of roads. These latter problems affect the daily life of a citizen more elementally than...

-The Hindu     Even a cursory look at how Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand have fared will tell us how the mere formation of a smaller State is no guarantee for better lives for those groups for whom these States have been created Smaller States have been the new political mode of addressing basic issues that were otherwise left unresolved. However, fighting for a new state and reconstructing on a more sustainable democratic content...

-The Hindu Even though fair elections are held at regular intervals for State Assemblies and Parliament, they do not reflect the true consent of the people because a large number of women are missing from the electorate On her arrival in India recently, the words of Gloria Steinem, American feminist and leader of the women's liberation movement, sounded like bells tolling for all women in today's modern Indian society. "I came [to...

-The Hindu Business Line Clientelism - tying benefits to political choices - cannot work because voting preferences cannot be ascertained. Do parties and their local agents link access to government services and benefits from government welfare schemes to how voters vote, or are expected to vote? This political strategy, which social scientists refer to as clientelism, depends on a massive investment in local leaders who collect information on voters' party preferences, vote choices...