Not one of the many analysts, opinion surveys and exit polls predicted that the opposition Congress-led front, spearheaded by Italian-born Sonia Gandhi, would oust the governing National Democratic Alliance (NDA) coalition, let alone in such a comprehensive manner.

Surprise election results

But happen it did. Out of 539 Parliamentary seats, the Congress and its allies won 217, as compared to the NDA’s 185. Before the dust had even settled, the Congress had conclusively roped in left parties to take the United Progressive Alliance - as it would come to be called - past the requisite figure of 272 seats needed to form a government.

In the meantime, agitated observers saw the stock market fluctuate, coalition allies jockeyed for cabinet berths, and within 10 days of the declaration of results, India had a government that few betting men would have predicted just months earlier.

Italian-born Sonia Gandhi declined to take the helm of India

The NDA, led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), was coming off five years of stable governance, and the popularity of Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, the moderate face of a Hindu nationalist outfit, cut across party lines. The BJP banked heavily on Vajpayee; and its 50-page “Vision Document,” which featured 55 photographs of him in various benign poses.

The NDA also took full responsibility for peace initiatives with Pakistan, a nuclear neighbor with which relations have long been rife with conflict. They also crafted as theirs the fruit of a burgeoning economy; a multi-million-rupee advertising campaign made the tagline "India Shining" a household phrase. They also brandied a suave, savvy generation of young leaders that positioned the BJP as a slick, professional, reform-oriented corporation. The Congress, in contrast, seemed to be a dated, misled, hobbling party, destined for defeat.

Gandhi dynasty

Of all the people who met their future spouses in Greek restaurants in Cambridge – or Greek restaurants anywhere for that matter – Antonia Maino’s life musthave changed the most dramatically. That future spouse was Rajiv Gandhi, older son of Indira Gandhi, prime minister and “Iron Lady” of India. Indira herself was the daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru – Mohandas Gandhi’s protégé, architect of the Congress Party, virtually the second-in-command of the Indian freedom movement, and the first prime minister from 1947 to 1964. Indira married Feroze Gandhi – no relation to the Mahatma – in 1942, and two years after her father’s death, she became prime minister in 1966. Controversy clouded her political career when she declared a state of emergency in 1975. For that suspension of democracy, the electorate ejected her in 1977; three years later, they voted her back. In 1980, Sanjay Gandhi, her younger son proclaimed widely as her heir, died in a plane crash, and Indira herself was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards in 1984. Rajiv stepped into the breach almost unwillingly, and served as prime minister until 1989, when he was killed by Sri Lankan extremists during an election campaign in 1991.

At the time, Antonia (in Indian: Sonia Gandhi) refused to enter politics. India had been governed by members of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty for 37 out of 44 years. Somewhat appropriately, the dynasty’s longest absence from prime-ministership has now been perpetuated by Sonia’s recent refusal of the post. But she did lead Congress to an upset win, and her articulate son and daughter seem poised in the wings to further the legacy of that little Greek restaurant.

BJP miscalculations

Ironically, perhaps the first people to notice trouble brewing were from BJP themselves. Suddenly abandoning their economic arguments, its leaders took to railing against the foreign origin of Congress President Sonia Gandhi, often spewing vitriol against her and her children. The BJP's two biggest mistakes, however, were strategic miscalculations, rather than just rhetoric in bad taste.

Its first error lay in assuming that a boosted urban economy had found resonance in rural India as well. "India lives in her villages," revered Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi once said, and 50 years on, that is no less true, particularly during elections. To the drought-stricken farmer in the southeastern coastal state of Andhra Pradesh or the flood-hit farmer in Orissa, it made little difference if more back-offices of multi-nationals were dotting cityscapes, if India was high on the list to be the next Formula One venue, or if foreign dollar reserves had touched a historic high. These rural votes cost the BJP dearly.

Interestingly, even the cities, supposedly the chief beneficiaries of the BJP's shining India, people overwhelmingly voted against the government. For the liberal, cosmopolitan electorate, the BJP's brand of Hindu nationalism was no selling point, and India's whirlwind economic progress was perceived as the offspring of tough, globally competitive companies, rather than the government's doing.

The situation on the ground

The BJP's other misjudgment was its choice of allies. The 2004 general elections, one analyst observed, was more a series of local elections, and invariably, local issues determined how states voted. In the southern states of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh in particular, the BJP's allied parties fared miserably.

The Congress proved more canny, stitching up alliances where none previously existed and assessing the ground situation remarkably. Throughout the country, to boot, a strong wave of anti-incumbency built up over the BJP's prolonged campaign. “Four-fifths of all elections in India are lost by incumbents,” noted Swaminathan S Aiyar, a renowned analyst. The 2004 elections proved no different.

Gandhi turns down PM post

The drama refused to cease after the results were announced. Having led her party to a victory of great pith and moment, receiving along the way the people's mandate to be prime minister, Sonia Gandhi turned the post down. A Congress meeting, hurriedly convened, extended into the night as leader after leader, with copious tears and pleafilled speech-making, asked Gandhi to reconsider her decision. But she had never been after a position or power, she said. She had merely wanted to resurrect the party of her late husband and mother-in-law, and her "inner voice" advised her against the taking up the post of prime minister. So stating, Sonia named Manmohan Singh in her stead.

The minority community celebrating Manmohan Singh, India’s first Sikh prime minister

It was a wise move. The Indian stock market, which had crashed by almost 800 points in a day in apprehension of a leftist influence in the government, recovered cautiously when Manmohan emerged as the prime minister-designate. A shrewd economist, Manmohan had kicked off the liberalization of India's economy as finance minister in the early 1990s, and that bodes well for a very specific reason.

For the loss of the NDA must not be seen as a vote against economic reform and change in India, but merely as a vote against what was perceived by the electorate as reform of the wrong kind.

Throughout the NDA's tenure, Manmohan had opposed arbitrary publicsector disinvestment and what was termed as illogical suspension of subsidies on purely economic grounds. And even before his swearing-in, he had promised India, in a slogan reminiscent of former Czechoslovak leader Alexander Dubcek's, "Reforms with a human face."

Manmohan will still have to toe a fine line. Too much liberalization, and the left can withdraw support and bring the government to its knees; too little, and the progress of the last decade - which Congress itself takes some credit for - will be undone. Diplomatically, the government will be more stable, united in pushing for peace with Pakistan and maintaining sound, but not subservient, relations with the United States and Europe.

The Congress-led government's biggest challenge will lie in doing exactly what the NDA failed to do - bring about positive authentic grass-roots changes. While corporate India has developed, rural India decided this election and made its vote heard. It is to rural India that the Congress-led government will be held accountable. It is now up to Manmohan Singh and his cabinet to generate some superlatives of their own.

Indo-Hungarian relations

In November 2003, Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Medgyessy set off with a delegation on an unprecedented seven-day official visit to India, stressing that Hungary could be a gateway to Europe for India, while the opposite could be true as a gateway for Hungary to South East Asian countries. On his trip, Medgyessy pointed out the need for Hungary to develop long-term cooperation plans, and to focus on supporting trade in non-traditional areas with the exchange of information and knowledge.

Indian Ambassador to Hungary Manbir Singh

Main import products from India are fabrics, leather, drugs and pharmaceuticals, chemicals, coffee and rice. Hungary exports organic chemicals, artificial resins, iron and steel products, machine tools and electric and electronic machinery. Hungary has several joint ventures operating in India, mostly in the vacuum technology, power generation and pharmaceutical fields, with telecommunications and transport areas becoming gradually more significant. Hungary future business cooperations plans include partnering with the Indian film industry, while India tries to secure and deepen its presence in Hungary’s IT sector.