1. New Rules for Indian Politics? June 17, 2015 INSTITUTE facebook.com/idfcinstitutetwitter.com/idfcinstituteWe’re also on Dr. Milan Vaishnav, Associate, South Asia Program, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace www.idfcinstitute.org

2. New Rules for Indian Politics? Milan Vaishnav | June 17, 2015

3. Was 2014 a game-changer? Source: @bhuvanthaker

4. 2014 elections by the numbers 8,251 candidates 464 political parties 554 million voters Estimated $5 billion in campaign expenditures

5. First single-party majority since 1984 Source: Vaishnav and Smogard (2014)

6. “Tsu-NaMo”

7. Source: CSDS Post-Poll Reversal of personal fortune

8. The Indian voter in 2015 Source: Indian Express

9. 1. BJP as new “pole”

10. National-regional equilibrium Source: Vaishnav and Smogard (2014)

11. A new central “pole” Source: Press Information Bureau

12. Congress on the decline

13. (Suit)-boots on the ground

14. Who controls the states?

15. 2. Moving towards “It’s the economy, stupid”

16. “It’s the economy, stupid!”

17. Triumph of parochialism

18. A cautionary tale? “India has not reached a stage where the people would prefer a CEO to a politician to run the government.” -- K.C. Suri (2004)

19. Good economics ≠ good politics Source: Vaishnav and Swanson (2015)

20. Are things changing? “Since independence, many Indian voters have reflexively ejected politicians from office even when they had compiled decent records in power…Recently, though, Indian voters have started to reward good performance, especially in state-level politics.” - Arvind Subramanian (2009)

21. 2009 Lok Sabha elections Source: Gupta and Panagariya (2014)

22. Good economics ≠ good politics Source: Vaishnav and Swanson (2013)

23. Post-2000s shift

24. Most important issue in 2014? Source: Lok Foundation (2014)

25. 2014 NES post-poll Source: CSDS (2014)

26. 3. Messy realities of ethnic voting

27. Social biases: positive & negative % of respondents demonstrating “bias” Source: Authors’ calculations based on Lok Foundation data

28. 2014 BJP performance in north India Source: CSDS (2014)

29. “Rainbow coalitions” (Bihar 2010) Social group% vote for NDA Brahmin64 Bhumihar48 Rajput68 Other Upper Caste89 Yadav18 Kurmi-Koeri70 Other OBC63 Chamars41 Pasi25 Other SC52 Muslim27 Others47 Source: CSDS (2010) Upper Caste OBC SC Minorities

30. Degree of co-ethnic voting Source: Vaishnav (2014)

31. Can voters ethnically identify candidates? Source: Vaishnav (2014)

32. 4. More choices, same options

33. Surge in political competition Source: ECI

34. Dynasticism among MPs Source: Chandra (2014)

35. “Princelings” in parliament Source: The Hindu (2014)

36. State-level dynasties Abdullahs(NC, Jammu& Kashmir) Badals(SAD, Punjab) Karunanidhis (DMK, Tamil Nadu) Hoodas (INC, Haryana) Paswans(LJP, Bihar) Patnaiks (BJP, Odisha) Pawars (NCP, Maharashtra) Reddys (YSRCP, AP) Scindias (INC/BJP, Rajasthan/MP) Thackerays (ShivSena, Maharashtra) Yadavs(RJD, Bihar) Yadavs (SP, UP)

37. Hereditary MPs (by age) Source: The Hindu (2014); French (2010)

38. Law-breakers & law-makers? Source: Author’s calculations based on ADR data

39. Par for the course Source: Author’s calculations based on ADR data

40. Male-female turnout convergence

41. Female representation is (slowly) growing

42. Conclusion Regionalization has stalled; BJP has become “central pole” – Blessing and a curse Aspirations of voters have changed, yet quality of candidates on offer has not Social biases remain entrenched even though their expression might be changing

43. Our next discussion…. INSTITUTE facebook.com/idfcinstitutetwitter.com/idfcinstituteWe’re also on Fundamental reform in Indian finance Dr. Ajay Shah Head of the Macro/Finance Group at the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy July 6, 2015 www.idfcinstitute.org