When Narendra Modi led his Bharatiya Janata party to a sweeping victory in India’s 2014 election, it was seen by many as an exceptional, one-off event, stemming from anger at the incumbent Congress party over economic instability and corruption.
But after his landslide re-election win yesterday, it is clear that his latest victory is the harbinger of a fundamental change — nothing less than the reordering of India’s political landscape.
The BJP, the political arm of a century-old ethno-nationalist movement, has emerged as the principal political force, supplanting Congress, which led the anti-colonial fight and dominated public life for decades after independence.