While U.S. officials refrained from comment on Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) massive victory in Delhi elections, the New York Times saw “A Defeat for Prime Minister Modi” in the results.
“Fresh from the diplomatic high of a successful summit meeting with President Obama, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been brought down to earth by domestic politics,” the daily said in an editorial. “Ordinarily, elections in New Delhi would not draw international attention,” the >Times said.
But since sweeping to power last year with the biggest national election victory in three decades, Mr. Modi and his BJP have generated “an aura of invincibility” winning a succession of other State elections, it said.
“The election won’t affect Modi’s hold on the Prime Minister’s Office and the federal government,” the Times said. “But it will increase the enormous pressure to deliver on his economic and governance promises even while making that harder.”
“After imploring Americans, Japanese and Chinese, as well as Indians, to believe in his vision, it is a good bet that no Indian federal budget will be more scrutinised for what it may, or may not, deliver on building infrastructure, reforming taxes and making a tangled, stratified system more efficient than the one Mr. Modi is expected to make public by the end of the month,” the Times said.
The State Department spokesperson declined comment on the Delhi elections calling it “an internal matter for the people and the Government of India.”
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