After the Lok Sabha elections, there was a perception about BJP that now its decline has started. It will remain the central force in the country’s politics, but its campaign which started in 2014 reached its peak in 2019 and now its decline has started from there.
The way the opposition campaigned in the assembly elections of two states, Jammu and Kashmir and Haryana, held immediately after the Lok Sabha elections, and the exit poll data after the voting, predicted the defeat of the BJP and the success of the Congress alliance. Indications were emerging that BJP has now become weak.
Different stories were being circulated regarding the weakness of the BJP leadership. It was being said that Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh is now going to take over BJP and now Narendra Modi will become the President of BJP not by the choice but by the choice of the Sangh. In one fell swoop, all these notions have vanished into thin air. The election results of Jammu Kashmir and Haryana have changed everything. BJP has come out of the shock of defeat in Lok Sabha elections and definitely the morale of its leaders and workers will be high.
Proving all the speculations wrong, BJP has won the elections in Haryana. This is the first time in the history of Haryana that a party has come to power for the third consecutive time. Never before had any party won three times in a row. Along with this political history, there were many other things which made it seem that BJP is on the back foot. BJP had changed the Chief Minister in March, due to which it seemed that there was a lot of anti-incumbency against Manohar Lal Khattar’s government of about nine and a half years.
After this, when Lok Sabha elections were held, BJP lost on five out of 10 seats. Congress reached five seats from zero, this also created a message that Congress is ahead and BJP is lagging behind. During the elections, BJP was fighting to win, while Congress leaders were fighting to become the Chief Minister. Congress’s victory was considered so certain that throughout the elections there was a fight over who would become the Chief Minister.
The popular perception was that the BJP would lose and the state BJP leaders also did not seem very confident. Despite this, the central leadership of BJP put in full force. Efforts were put into micro management and a lot of efforts were made to create social equations. From BJP’s election in-charge Dharmendra Pradhan to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, they tried their best. BJP leaders showed how to fight even if the battle seems to be losing. This will give a lot of strength to BJP’s politics. By turning the tables on Haryana, BJP has infused new enthusiasm among its workers for the Maharashtra and Jharkhand elections and has also boosted the morale of its supporters. The impact of this result will also be visible in the assembly elections to be held in Delhi after four months.
Apart from Haryana, the result of Jammu and Kashmir is also not very disappointing for BJP. It has won 29 seats. Last time it had got 25 seats. That was the time when Narendra Modi’s magic was at its peak. In May 2014, he formed the government at the Center and after that assembly elections were held in Jammu and Kashmir, in which BJP became the second party with 25 seats.
This time BJP has won 29 seats. Although it could not be in a position to form the government, it greatly weakened the Congress, which was considered strong in the Jammu region till this election. Congress has won a total of six seats in Jammu and Kashmir. Farooq and Omar Abdullah’s party National Conference has managed to win 41 seats on its own. Keep in mind that last time another regional party PDP was the largest party with 28 seats. This time National Conference is the largest party. BJP has maintained its position.
These two results of the assembly are going to have a big impact. This will have an impact on the internal politics of BJP as well as on the relations between Sangh and BJP. After the Lok Sabha elections, the taunts being made about Modi by everyone from the RSS chief to the ideologues of BJP will definitely reduce. Assembly elections are going to be held in two more states, Maharashtra and Jharkhand next month, the impact of these results will be visible in those states also.
BJP has got a new mantra in these two states and that is that if there is no grand theme or no big story then how to win elections through micro management instead of creating a narrative. BJP has done tremendous management at the grassroots level to turn the tables in Haryana and along with it has also increased its social equation. She will use this in future elections also.
The election result of Haryana should be a matter of concern for the Congress because the positive conditions for the Congress as found in Haryana cannot be found anywhere else. There was a perfect pitch for him in Haryana. There are three groups that decide the politics there. Soldiers, farmers and wrestlers, these three groups influence the politics of Haryana the most and BJP was infamous among these three groups. These three groups seemed to be helping the Congress. Despite this, Congress could not win the elections. It is time for Congress to introspect. The future elections will be more difficult than this. When she could not win such an easy battle, what would happen in the future battles?