Last week, election results in the Indian state of West Bengal revealed the dramatic defeat of the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) party, which ruled the state legislature for the past 15 years. The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which leads India’s national government and controls 22 other states and union territories, finally breached this regional bastion. Capturing nearly 46 percent of the vote to the AITC’s 41 percent, the BJP won 207 seats in the legislature while the AITC