Modi mauled in Hindu heartland

NEW DELHI: The ruling party of India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi Tuesday suffered a major setback just a few months before a general election, trailing the rival Congress party in three key state polls.

In the last set of state elections before the whole country goes to the ballot box in the spring, preliminary results showed bad defeats for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, and the vote hanging in the balance in Madhya Pradesh.

All three are big, populous states that handed dozens of seats to the BJP as Modi swept to victory in the last general election in 2014.

And as much as the results were a blow to the ruling party, they will provide a big boost to the image of both Congress and its leader Rahul Gandhi, who has come under particularly vicious attack from supporters of the present government.

As counting continued, Mr. Gandhi addressed the media to claim victory in all three of the big states.

“The election results are out, and I congratulate Congress workers and the people. It’s the people’s win, the youth’s win,” he said. He said the BJP had lost the vote in the mostly rural states because he “refused to listen” to what farmers and young people living outside cities had to say.

Hundreds of thousands of people have joined farmers’ protests in the capital Delhi in recent months, demanding the government put in place higher minimum pricing for their goods.

At the same time, Mr. Modi has been accused of failing to meet his promise of providing a jobs boon in rural economies. “He refused to listen to the heartbeat of the country. A certain amount of arrogance came in,” Mr. Gandhi said.