The spectacle next door

The spirit of the grand Indian election fest did not seem to have waned much in Bihar.

As it often happens with India's Bihar Assembly elections, exit polls went wrong. They had predicted a comfortable victory for Mahagathbandhan , or the grand alliance, which included the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Indian National Congress, and leftist parties, including the Communist Party of India and the Communist Party of India-Marxist. The exit polls were hardly unbelievable. After all, the anti-incumbency shrill against Nitish Kumar's government was quite loud, the opposition parties' case against unemployment pretty solid and the youthful energy of opposition leader Tejashwi Yadav more prominent than that of the ageing Chief Minister.