Assembly polls 2023: Modi remains X factor; women and tribals power BJP’s juggernaut

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has got a head-start for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls with emphatic victories in the Assembly elections in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. The Congress on the other hand has won a consolation victory in Telangana and lost badly in the above mentioned three states. Here are some key takeaways from the assembly poll results: Women and tribals: BJP’s new constituency The voting pattern in the states shows that women and tribal voters have overwhelmingly supported the BJP. This supplemented the traditional vote base of the BJP in other backward castes, middle class and urban centres. In addition to other factors, the BJP owes its victory to the comeback it has made in the tribal belt of Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. The factor which helped the party consolidate in this area is a division amongst the tribal vote on the issue of cancelling reservation under the Scheduled Tribe category for those tribals who have converted to Christianity. A number of rallies were held by an outfit called Janjati Suraksha Manch in the tribal areas across the country. The attendance was huge in these rallies but wasn’t noticed much by the mainstream media. In addition, getting Droupadi Murmu, a tribal woman elected as the President of India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement of celebrating the birth anniversary of Bhagwan Birsa Munda as Janjatiya Gaurav Diwas and launching specific welfare schemes for tribals across the country fuelled the BJP juggernaut in this area. There are 47 seats in the Lok Sabha reserved for the Scheduled Tribes. The outcome of the Assembly polls indicate that the BJP is likely to do quite well on these seats. The women are another constituency which the BJP has been able to build over a number of years and now it appears to be both expanding and consolidating this constituency. Central schemes like Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao and Ujjawala Yojana have brought direct benefits to the women voters. In states like Madhya Pradesh, these were supplemented effectively by state level schemes such as Ladali Lakshmi Yojana. A big impact, it appears, has been made on the psyche of the women voters by the Modi government enacting a legislation to reserve one-third of the all seats in the Lok Sabha and state legislative assemblies. The cap on the LPG cylinder prices under the Ujjawala Yojana has also helped a great deal. The BJP is also aided by the fact that it has a strong women leadership both at the Centre and the state level with leaders like Vasundhara Raje Scindhia, Smriti Irani, Nirmala Sitharaman playing an important role in the party and the government indicating that the BJP is walking the talk on empowering women. Unorthodox approach The BJP continues to surprise its rivals through an unorthodox approach and innovative thinking. This time it fielded several central ministers and Lok Sabha MPs in the Assembly polls. This helped the BJP to quell the dissent, send a message across how serious it was about the Assembly polls and create a momentum by boosting the morale of the cadre. In its faction-ridden units of Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, it experimented with not projecting any specific state leader. In Madhya Pradesh also while the sitting Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan led from the front, the message was clear that it was a poll fought by the BJP led by Narendra Modi and it wasn’t turned into a Shivraj vs Congress battle. However, the three senior-most leaders of the BJP in Rajasthan (Vasundhra Raje Scindhia), Madhya Pradesh (Shivraj Singh Chouhan) and Chhattisgarh (Raman Singh) were given due respect and important space in the party’s campaign at the local level. Modi factor Prime Minister Narendra Modi continues to be the X factor for the BJP. His connect with the masses and the trust that he has earned continues to pay rich political dividends to the BJP at the state level, especially in the Hindi heartland as the party has a strong organisational base to capitalise on that. The pro-incumbency wave in favour of Modi that is expected to sail the BJP through in 2024 Lok Sabha polls also helps the BJP at the state level. Even where the party loses such as it did in Karnataka, the Modi factor helped in the party getting to a respectable position. In Himachal Pradesh too, the BJP missed power by a whisker. The Congress came to power in Himachal Pradesh polling only 37,000 votes more than the BJP. Congress: Confused and Divided Congress has failed to set its house in order as with weakening of central leadership, the regional satraps are involved in bitter power struggles. It also doesn’t seem to have a plan to take on the BJP in a straight fight. In Telangana, its victory was against the BRS, a regional outfit, while in the three north Indian states, it lost in the straight fight against the BJP. The factional feuds in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh cost the party. In Madhya Pradesh too, the bonhomie between Kamal Nath and Digvijay Singh was more for political optics. At least that is what the results are reflecting. Conclusion The Assembly poll results have boosted the BJP’s campaign for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The Congress seems to be, however, making a recovery in the southern part of the country as its victory in Karnataka has been followed by a convincing win in Telangana. The BJP is not expected to be complacent about the Lok Sabha polls even after this victory as the past records have shown that the poll outcomes at the state need not necessarily translate to the poll outcome in the Lok Sabha. However, the Congress appears to be in a much weaker position than it was in the run up to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. It had won the three north Indian states then. The BJP, meanwhile, can launch its Lok Sabha poll campaign now on a positive note with an effort to consolidate its gains further. The writer is an author and columnist and has written several books. He tweets @ArunAnandLive. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. 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