New Delhi: A non-work trip to Budapest, just three weeks before the general election there, was shocking for someone travelling from India.Being a neighbour to Hungary on the V-Dem index of electoral autocracies (this year particularly close – Hungary is just a rank above India) lent me to expect a flurry of Orbans on billboards in the capital. The Modi government spends millions of Indian public money to have his visage plastered all over, so where was Viktor Orban?You could be mistaken into thinking that it was actually Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and the European Union chief, Ursula von der Leyen, contesting the election. Adorning all pillars and walls in the city, Orban’s chief challenger, the ex-Fidesz partyman and now incumbent prime minister Peter Magyar was on the Fidesz posters.Orban had retreated. Picture-wise, at least. Targeting and villainising opponents seemed a better bet. The implication was that Hungary would be dragged into the Ukrainian war and significant amounts of tax money would go towards fuelling Europe’s support for the war between Ukraine and Russia, a PhD student from Chile studying in Budapest told me.The 79.5% voter turnout, the highest since 1989, has overwhelmingly voted to oust Orban.Only Hungarians were voting in this election, but the 16-year Orban regime ending has implications for well beyond the borders.In Europe, as Orban’s campaign itself has unintentionally pointed to, his departure marks the uprooting of the strongest basecamp that far-right parties in the continent had banked upon, to make an anti-migrant and anti-Muslim stance look like fait accompli and countries like Spain and Portugal the outliers. Italy is run by a far-right, neo-fascist party, but Hungary having lasted 16 years made it appear like it was defining the future of Europe.A two-minute clip was posted by Orban on social media, stringing together European conservatives – Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, her deputy Matteo Salvini, French far-right’s Marine Le Pen, Alternative for Germany (AfD) co-leader Alice Weidel, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Russia’s president Vladimir Putin has lost an influential friend in Europe, as Orban was an important pillar holding out on the EU taking a far more cohesive position on the attack against Ukraine.Hungarian parliament. Photo: Seema ChishtiGaza and the war in West Asia has roiled European public opinion. The leadership has taken bizarre positions, especially in the UK and Germany, at complete variance with popular opinion there as reflected in protests that continue and in the polling. But no one welcomed Benjamin Netanyahu like Orban did. Last year, after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Bibi, he went on a state visit to Budapest as Orban’s guest. Hours after he landed a year ago, Orban thought nothing of withdrawing Hungary from the ICC. Netanyahu hailed Hungary’s “bold and principled” decision. In this election, an important Netanyahu aide – his son – went to Hungary to campaign for Orban. In March 2026, at the CPAC Hungary 2026 meet, Yair Netanyahu praised Orban effusively. “In Hungary, there is no terror. Society is more homogeneous, there is social cohesion compared to Western Europe, which suffers from weak leadership.” Orban’s departure breaks that impunity, revealing that being ‘nativist’, ‘cultural’ and ‘rooted’ is actually about hitting out at basic decencies and some settled principles of how every other human being must be treated.Beyond Europe and West Asia, Donald Trump’s discomfiture with Orban getting booted is clear with him not answering questions about his defeat. That the US Vice President, J.D. Vance, was on a campaign trip and Orban lost decisively smacks of the Canadian effect – when Trump’s support is a definite liability. The Centre for American Progress issued a statement welcoming the result. “It’s also a major blow to those who have looked to Viktor Orbán’s corrupt model as a blueprint—including Donald Trump himself. Orbán has been an architect of a global authoritarian playbook and the perversion of democracy.”Peter Magyar of the Tisza party campaigned for a “regime change” in this election. Orban, in his 16 years, built in full-throttle control of the country’s media, judiciary and education system, and severe damage to the rule of law has, if not spawned, definitely provided the authoritarian blueprint. Social conservatism, an emphasis on homogeneity and also the curtailment of LGBTQ+ rights resulted in UEFA sanctioning the Hungarian Football Federation after anti-LGBTQ+ banners and discriminatory behaviour by fans ensued during the Euro 2020 matches. This was even before LGBTQ+ public events were outlawed last year.From how to behave with a war criminal prime minister (Netanyahu), to arguing that ethnicity defines citizenship, that universities must be controlled, media freedoms curtailed and LGBTQ+ not allowed to self-identify – there is much on which the present Indian government fully aligns with Orban. The similarities between Hungary and India have not been hush-hush. They have been studied and located on tables with authoritarian turns. Hungary was noted for its centrality in the authoritarian universe for its geographical situation and the sheer time that Orban had controlled its Parliament and extended his control over Hungarian society. Modi’s India is held out as the other significant autocratiser to Orban’s Hungary. It too is adding up in terms of time (12 years in government now) and the size of the country, the number of people it pushes as said to be living in a steeply autocratising environment, adds to its oversized push towards authoritarian rule. Orban proudly called his country an “illiberal democracy”. With parallel calls to not regard ‘constitutional values’ as goals or markers, how far apart is our government?But for now, by the banks of the Danube late at night, as Magyar reaffirmed, it is the voice of the Hungarian people that finally got through and made itself heard. “This mandate makes possible a transition that is efficient, just and peaceful.”‘Orbanism’, after a 16-year stay, may take longer to be fully taken out of the system, but it has been dealt a death blow. More than the 3.3 million votes, the highest any party in modern Hungary has won, will be watching with interest. And a stake.