TO all those so called Secular people of India
US, whoes constitution bars non citizens becoming the president of the country, US, in which not a single time there is history of minority person holding the higest constitutional position, US in which, there is so much racial profiling, and discrimination and ill-treatment to anyone who even looks any closer to Arab or muslim....giving us lecture about all this....this type things makes me support BJP even more..that arouses my nationalism and Patriotism more !!
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http://www.newindpress.com/Newsitem...R+E+A+K+I+N+G++++N+E+W+S&Topic=304&Full~Story
Masterful move by Sonia Gandhi: US experts
Wednesday May 19 2004 14:12 IST
IANS
WASHINGTON: US experts feel Congress chief Sonia Gandhi's refusal to be prime minister is an astute move to stem the shrill conservative attack on her Italian heritage and allow the new government to focus on developing and implementing its agenda.
They also say the Bush administration will have to learn how to get along with a left-of-centre government in India even as the Congress may change the tone of the relationship with the US but not its content.
"Once the Bush administration came in, I think there was a more conscious effort on the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) part to be close on grounds that it was the most conservative party in India," said Teresita Schaffer, former US deputy assistant secretary of state for South Asia.
"The Bush administration will now have to get used to working with a left-of-centre government, they are more comfortable working with a right-of-centre government," she emphasised.
Calling Sonia Gandhi's decision to reject being prime minister a "brilliant stroke", Schaffer said this takes an issue away from the BJP.
Bringing Manmohan Singh, the virtual author of the economic reforms programme back in 1991, to the post would be well received worldwide, including the US, she indicated.
"He is a very much known quantity both in India and abroad and a man with a strong reputation."
Said Columbia University professor Jagdish Bhagwati: "I am very pleased with Manmohan Singh (possibly) coming to prime ministership."
"There is nothing to fear as far as economic reforms are concerned. It was pragmatism that led to the economic reforms in the first place when the public sector expansion did not work. Privatisation will continue because it was not motivated by ideology.
"Manmohan Singh's comments on accommodation in economic reform are consistent with India maintaining a momentum in favour of privatization, on pragmatic grounds -- we shed what has not worked and keep what has," Bhagwati told IANS.
Schaffer said the three things Washington is concerned about is economic policy, policy toward Pakistan and India-US relations.
Under the new government, she opined, "The established reform policies will carry on, though new reform policies will come more slowly than they have done, and in particular, privatisation will come to a temporary halt, but note that it was not moving very fast any way."
On relations with Pakistan, she pointed to Congress leader Natwar Singh's statements committing the new administration to carry on what outgoing Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee initiated.
"So it is in the details that things may change. The Congress will have people in the administration who have been out of power for eight years, and they will need time to internalise the changes in those years and decide whether they would want to keep the changes made to India's traditional positions, and whether they will take cognisance of things Pakistan has done to cut down attacks on the Line of Control (in Kashmir)," Schaffer said.
Relations with the US would probably remain the same, the experts said.
"The issue again will be one of tone. There are lots of issues on which India and the United States disagree. We may see some more strident disagreement... which may cause some uncomfortable moments but won't change the relationship," Schaffer contended.
She noted that military to military and security ties had strengthened in the last few years, and "the Left parties will want that diminished. The Congress will have to see how to deal with it."
Ainsley Embree, among the oldest India experts in the United States, said Sonia Gandhi's decision was "good news for India. If she became prime minister, I am sure this would have given a great cause to the BJP and the RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) - they would have become even more Hindu nationalist attacking the idea of secularism, attacking Muslims."
Even otherwise, he said, "The Congress victory is going to leave BJP free to be much more Hindu, much more anti-Pakistan, and much more anti-Muslim."
Manmohan Singh, Embree told IANS, "is a modern man and he will make a good prime minister. He is well respected in this country and around the world."
For the Bush administration, there will be no change he contended.
"They want to keep the balancing act going in South Asia. But if things get much worse in Iraq, it will affect Afghanistan and Pakistan and Kashmir," he cautioned.
Said Bhagwati: "One very definitely good thing that has come out of this election - one cannot justify any massacre and I think the effect of that Gujarat massacre was to deliver a rebuke to the BJP. Not only would the Muslims not vote for the BJP, but even the Hindu vote would have changed somewhat."
"The messages being conveyed that communalism is unacceptable and that reform is good are both good messages."
). MP and Rajasthan have not punished BJP because it just came to power but i am sure the next elections will bring congress back to power in those states (and TDP in AP