New social forces to come into full play

The highpoint of 2014 will be the political battle between the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi in May.

The highpoint of 2014 will be the political battle between the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi in May. Social forces unleashed by liberalisation, right to information, and social media explosion will all come into full play for the first time next year, in the 16th general election. There are several known unknowns that await us in 2014 – which regional parties will support Modi, will the BJP sacrifice Modi if so required by political expediency, will the Congress go below 100 seats in the Lok Sabha for the first time in its history, will either Rahul or Modi survive an election defeat, how will Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party fare in the Lok Sabha elections, how will India’s first Lok Pal go about tackling corruption, and will Indo-US relations improve? And there could be several unknown unknowns. As they unfold, watch this space for more.