Ghandi dynasty returns to power in shock win

THE Gandhi political dynasty prepared for a return to power yesterday after it was handed a stunning victory in India’s elections.

The result reflected anger among millions of India's rural poor over being left out of the economic boom fostered by the current government.

The Hindu nationalist party of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee conceded the vote, leaving Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born widow of the former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, to take the helm of the world's largest democracy. Mr Vajpayee resigned yesterday but was to stay on until the new government is formed, the president's secretary said. He was to address the nation later on television.

The result was one of the most dramatic political upsets since Indian independence almost 60 years ago.

After more than 11 hours of vote-counting for 539 of Parliament's 543 elected seats, official results showed Congress and its allies were leading the 11-member National Democratic Alliance by 178 seats to 146. seats

"We have not got the mandate of the people," said Venkaiah Naidu, president of Mr Vajpayee's Bharatiya Janata Party. He said the decision to concede the race was made at a 90-minute meeting of the party and its coalition partners.

The opposition Congress Party and its allies had already claimed victory and some promised that Gandhi, the party leader, would be the next prime minister. There was still no official decision, however, and she must form a coalition with leftist parties that could object to her taking the leadership role in part because of her foreign origins.

Mrs Gandhi won a seat in the northern town of Rae Bareli. Her 34-year-old son Rahul, whose grandmother, Indira, and great-grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru, were both Prime Ministers of the counrty, won a seat in Amethi, Mrs Ghandi's previous constituency.

Mrs Gandhi now faces the same challenges as she did in 1999, when she failed to take over the government due to disagreement over whether she should become prime minister. Among her potential allies on the left are senior politicians with much more experience and without their support she won't have a majority in Parliament.

George Fernandes, the defence minister in the outgoing governmentunder Vajpayee, said the new Parliament could meet as early as Monday.

It was an embarrassing The defeat was an unexpected snub for Mr Vajpayee's Hindu nationalist-led government. He had called elections six months early because he felt confident of winning an even bigger majority in Parliament, based on the roaring economy and prospects of peace with nuclear rival Pakistan.

Before the five-phased elections, which began on April 20, Mr Vajpayee and his alliance had been expected to win enough seats to eventually form a government and rule the country for another five years.

But Congress focused its campaign on the country's 300 million people who still live on less than a dollar a day. It hammered away at the lack of basic infrastructure, electricity and drinkable water for millions.

A leading figure in Mr Vajpayee's coalition said the results were "totally against our expectations."

Pakistan expressed confidence yesterday that the peace process would continue despite the result. Information minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said that the process involved the two governments, not "individual personalities".