Nobel laureate Professor Amartya Sen has said that the Delhi election results could affect the assembly elections in West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh.
In an interview with PTI, Sen highlighted that every election in India has an impact on others and there could be an effect of the Delhi election in his home state.
“In Bengal, even though secular parties like the Trinamool Congress, the CPI(M) and the Congress have gone separate ways, there is still something of a social consensus on the importance of secularism, and also for education and health care for all, and even for social justice. I do not see a Delhi-type debacle happening in West Bengal,” the Nobel laureate claimed.
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“So yes, we have to watch out. But think dialectically. With a greater focus on non-corrupt, honest governance, and a secular, justice-oriented and tolerant society, I don’t think Bengal is in great danger of falling into a sectarian trap,” he added.
Sen, however, also pointed out that the big impact of the poll results in Delhi may be on the elections in Uttar Pradesh.
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“…I think the big impact may be on elections in Uttar Pradesh,” Sen told PTI. “The lesson to learn from the AAP’s poll debacle is to reinforce to a great extent what the Samajwadi Party did at the time of the general election, namely, to take a clear stand against Hindutva politics. Most Indians don’t want a Hindu Rashtra.”
Further, he hoped that “the Delhi election results would have the effect of emphasising the need for unity of vision.”
Amartya Sen on Delhi election results
In his interview, the Nobel laureate also said that the Congress and AAP should have fought the Delhi elections together with mutually agreed commitments.
“I don’t think the result of the Delhi elections should be exaggerated, but it certainly has its significance. And if the AAP had won there, that victory would have carried its own weight,” Sen told PTI.
The eminent economist pointed out that one factor has been the “lack of unity among those who did not want a Hindutva-oriented government in Delhi”.
“If you look at the numbers in many seats, the margin of BJP’s advantage over the AAP was less, sometimes far less, than the votes that the Congress received,” he said.
The BJP won a historic mandate in Delhi polls, returning to power in the national capital after 27 years by ousting AAP. It secured a two-thirds majority, bagging 48 out of 70 seats, while AAP’s tally saw a massive drop to 22 from its previous tally of 62.
(Inputs from PTI)