NEW DELHI: The clear victory for the Congress-led alliance in recent general elections has sidelined an array of regional and left leaning parties, which came to the center stage of Indian politics over the last two decades as national parties lost influence. The elections have also paved the way for the Congress Party to recover its position as India's dominant political force. Days after the Congress Party-led alliance won comfortably in the general elections, Mayawati, the head of a caste-based regional group known as the Bahujan Samaj Party, pledged her party's support to the coalition. Mayawati says she is making the offer to extend a friendly hand to the Congress Party "without any conditions."Hers is among several regional and caste based parties which have volunteered to support the Congress-led alliance, which is returning for its second term in office. This is not what any of these parties had expected to do. Rather they had nurtured ambitions of being wooed by the Congress Party, and driving a hard bargain such as prized seats in the Cabinet in return for their support.Their optimism stemmed from forecasts that the results in this year's election would be even more fractured than it has been in past elections. Since 1991, India has been governed by unwieldy coalition governments, dependent on an array of small parties for their survival.But the 2009 elections reversed the trend. The Congress Party-led alliance confounded all forecasts, and has emerged slightly short of a majority - but strong enough to survive without the support of regional parties.
Friday, August 14, 2009 MUMBAI: A 26-year-old woman died Thursday of H1N1 swine flu in the southern city of Bangalore, raising India's death toll from the virus to 20, authorities said.The death was the first reported in India's information technology capital, the Press Trust of India reported.Meanwhile in Pune, the worst-affected in India, two more victims of the virus died Thursday, raising the death toll in that western city near Mumbai to 12, the report said. The victims were an 11-month-old boy and a 75-year-old old woman.US media reported movie halls, schools and colleges were ordered closed Thursday for three days to a week in Mumbai, the commercial and financial capital of the country, as fear of the pandemic spread.Prajakata Lavangare, a spokeswoman for the government of Maharashtra state of which Mumbai is the capital, said similar orders were issued in Pune, which is also located in the state.The woman who died in Bangalore was identified only as Roopa, a teacher in...
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