Faizel Patel, Radio Islam News – 24-05-2019

(Twitter: @FaizelPatel143)

Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi has claimed victory in India’s general election and vowed an “inclusive” future, with his party headed for a landslide win to crush the Gandhi dynasty’s comeback hopes.

AFP reports that with around half the 600 million votes cast counted, Election Commission data showed Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) winning 300 of India’s 543 elected lower house seats.

According to AFP, the BJP’s main rivals Congress were on just 49 seats, with Rahul Gandhi – the great-grandson, grandson and son of three premiers – in danger of a humiliating loss in the seat held by India’s once-mighty political dynasty for generations.

Modi, a former cadre in the militaristic hardline Hindu group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and chief minister of Gujurat in 2002 when riots killed more than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims, is also seen as divisive.

Lynchings of Muslims and low-caste Dalits for eating beef and slaughtering and trading in cattle have risen, adding to anxiety among India’s 170-million-strong Muslim population.

Under Modi several cities with names rooted in India’s Islamic Mughal past have been re-named, while some school textbooks have been changed to downplay Muslims’ contributions to India.