Fractured poll mandate will drive political instability to 16-year high

Mint Political Instability Index shows political instability scaled its peak in 1991, fell substantially during 2000s before rising sharply during UPA II

A strong mandate after the 16 May results will drive down the Mint Political Stability index value to a four-year low. Photo: Reuters

Political instability has become a key concern for voters, investors and credit rating agencies alike during this election season. In a first-of-its-kind attempt to quantify political instability, Mint examined a variety of factors that contribute to political instability to come up with a composite index of political instability in India.

The Mint Political Instability Index (MPI index), based on trends since 1981, shows political instability scaled its peak in 1991 and fell substantially during the 2000s before rising sharply over the past few coalition) will drive up the index of political instability to a 16-year high. A strong mandate (which we define as 280 seats for the single largest party in the ruling coalition) will drive down the MPI index valueyears during the second term of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government.

Mint’s analysis shows that with everything else remaining the same in 2014 as in 2013, a fractured or weak mandate on 16 May (which we define as 140 seats for the single largest party in the ruling  to a four-year low.

The MPI index is a composite gauge that assigns equal weights to five disparate indices—the index of political paralysis, the index of economic misery, the index of demographic instability, the perception of corruption index and the communal conflict index. All index values are normalized and averaged to yield a composite index, which takes values between 0 and 1(see chart on Page 2) for detailed methodology) for each year since 1981. Values closer to 1 indicate higher instability, while values closer to 0 indicate lower instability.

MUNTAZIR ALAM

PGDM 2ND 

SOURCE-- GOOGLE NEWS