India had a stock market crash yesterday.

Indian stocks were in virtual free-fall on Monday, wiping out 40 billion dollars in market value, amid frenzied selling on fears a new Congress-led government will slow the pace of reform in Asia's fastest-growing economy.

The Bombay Stock Exchange and National Stock Exchange suspended trading after their benchmark indices fell 15.5 percent and 17.5 percent, respectively. Both racked up their biggest point drop ever and sank to their lowest levels since late September.

It did not receive much notice here. This is mentioned in the fifth paragraph of the NYT story Gandhi Stakes Her Claim to Lead a Rattled India.

Although the market rebounded today, CNN International reports that "Monday the Sensex closed down 11 percent at 450 5.16, after plunging almost 16 percent at one point."

The Times of India is reporting that Monday night, Sonia Gandhi refused to become Prime Minister:

Sonia Gandhi reluctant to become PM

NEW DELHI: Congress President Sonia Gandhi has declined to become the Prime Minister despite leading her party to a spectacular comeback in elections, a senior party leader said on Tuesday.

He said she had made known her decision to the party on Monday evening itself.

Sonia, who is being persuaded by senior leaders of her party and the victorious multi-party United Progressive Alliance to change her mind, has apparently recommended Manmohan Singh and Pranab Mukherjee, both senior leaders of her party, for the job.

The argument for privatization in India is pretty much the same as is used here, and presumably has many of he same pitfalls. One of the key events of the election was apparently the sari stampede:

. . . one of the more powerful images of the election campaign is that of scores of impoverished women being crushed and trampled to death in a stampede for cheap, one-dollar saris distributed in Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's constituency of Lucknow.

At least 22 women died in a frenzied rush for the lengths of unstitched cloth, symbolic of womanhood in South Asia, which were being distributed free by Lalji Tandon, top leader of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in northern Uttar Pradesh state, during the election campaign. Lucknow is the state capital.