Decisive election victory will strengthen Modi's reforms push

WITH his resounding victory last week in crucial state elections, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has underlined his stature as the most popular leader in the country - arguably the most popular since Indira Gandhi in the early 1970s. In the state of Uttar Pradesh (UP), India's largest and home to 204 million people and 6 per cent of the world's poor, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) under Mr Modi won 312 of the 403 seats. Along with allies, the BJP's tally went up to 324.

Apart from UP, four other Indian states went to the polls: Uttarakhand, Punjab, Goa and Manipur. However, UP's size and political importance ensured that most of the focus was on this crucial state. Any party which aspires to power in New Delhi needs to go through UP - in 2014 Mr Modi's BJP won 72 out of the state's alloted 80 seats in Parliament. Seven of India's 12 former prime ministers came from this state and even Mr Modi, a native of the state of Gujarat, contested the 2014 general election from UP's prestigious constituency of Varanasi.

Coming roughly at the half-way mark in Mr Modi's five-year term, these state elections were billed as a referendum on his tenure thus far. The results were also thought to show whether Mr Modi's decision on Nov 8, 2016 to demonetise two high-denomination notes - 500 rupees and 1,000 rupees - in order to crack down on India's massive black economy had the support of the common people who were supposed to be worst affected by the move. The two high-value notes together accounted for 86 per cent of all cash in circulation in India when the decision was announced and the exercise has been roundly criticised by both politicians as well as economists. But the voters of UP appear to have rewarded rather than penalised Mr Modi for the audacious move.