BJP aim to ride Modi wave to electoral success in Jammu

It is with good reason that Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah just acknowledged the startling growth of the BJP in his state, and called Narendra Modi a man it would be dangerous to ignore. Buoyed by the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate, the state BJP unit in winter capital Jammu is preparing to “surprise” political pundits in the upcoming assembly elections in 2014, something the UPA will surely be looking at warily as it prepares for Lok Sabha polls that will be held months before Assembly elections. [caption id=“attachment_1168589” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] BJP’s PM candidate Narendra Modi. AFP[/caption] The party, according to its state leaders, is ready to repeat and outdo the 2008 assembly elections miracle, when it had won 11 seats in Jammu, for the first time in the history of electoral politics in Jammu and Kashmir. Its tally before that had been a single elected legislator. Right now, the party has begun earnest preparations for a first-ever grand rally by the BJP in Jammu, to be addressed by Modi with “more than one lakh people” in attendance, by the account of the Bharatiya janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) state president Ravinder Raina. The rally is scheduled for the first week of December but the party has already dispatched its senior leaders both to Kashmir and Ladakh, the other two regions of the state, were they are holding talks with activists to ensure that the rally is a resounding success. “We are of the firm belief that Narendra Modi’s popularity wave in Jammu will make us the next king makers in the state, no government can’t be formed without our support," Raina told Firstpost. Modi, who had earlier called off a visit to Jammu, and the BJP will now be looking to cash in on a sustained polarization over the past several months in Jammu region, only sharpened by the recent communal clashes in Kishtwar. Notably, while Kishtwar was burning, the party wasted no time in dispatching senior leader Arun Jaitley, considered one of the party’s main strategists for the coming polls, to visit the strife hit town. That visit was disallowed by the state government. A verbal exchange between a few people on the day of Eid had led to a scuffle and, within hours, the two main markets of the town were reduced to cinders. Smoke was billowing out of the town when columns of the army marched in to put an end to the violence that left three dead and 30 wounded. Modi, who was in Hyderabad at that time, had slammed the state government for its decision to not permit Jaitley’s visit, terming it “undemocratic” and motivated by a state government that “does not want the truth about the Kishtwar violence to come out”. Months later, analysts feel, the party might benefit beyond Kishtwar, hoping in fact to replicate the success it experienced in the aftermath of the 2008 Amarnath agitation when it wrested votes from rival Congress, for the first time in history of Jammu and Kashmir. The turbulent 2008 Amarnath row that ended after 61 days of a violent standoff was followed by assembly elections in the backdrop of a wholly changed political equation. Before the 2008 Assembly elections, the BJP was represented by a lone member in the state legislature. During the 2008 Kashmir unrest, party men blocked the supply of essential commodities to Kashmir by erecting barricades on the National Highway after the controversial decision by the then Congress-led coalition government to transfer a piece of land to the Amarnath Shrine Board. The move earned them the sympathy of voters in Jammu. The party won 11 seats. In Kashmir valley too, more than 25,000 votes were polled in favour of the BJP. The Congress made way to join a National Conference-led coalition government. This time around, there has been the Kishtwar saga, plus the growing popularity of Narendra Modi, a cause of concern for the Congress high command in Delhi, who are now reportedly thinking about a pre-poll alliance in the state. Jammu has just two Lok Sabha seats and can hardly impact the electoral performance of the BJP nationally, but Modi’s rally is expected to do two things: One, it will galvanise the state unit of the party that has been riven with differences and camps, including an embarrassing cross-voting incident by its MLAs in the legislature. And two, if he is able to pull together the cadre and work his magic, the Gujarat chief minister will add to his pan India charisma, not in the least because this is the state with India’s largest Muslim population. The BJP had faced acute embarrassment in April two years back when seven of its 11 legislators violated the party whip and voted for the National Conference-Congress alliance candidates instead of the party nominees to the legislative council. Following the cross-voting, the party had expelled one MLA and suspended six, causing rifts within the party and a subsequent lack of public confidence in the BJP. But Modi, while addressing a gathering in Pathankot early this year, portrayed himself as a leader who unifies, saying he would work for bringing people together. He talked about the need to “heal the wounds” of Kashmiris and connect its aspiring youth with the national mainstream for better development of the state. He even invoked former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and said the task he left incomplete would be pursued by the BJP if it is voted to power in J&K. Political analysts believe the popularity and likely influence of Narendra Modi in the Jammu area could leverage BJP’s political standing in the state, and help it retain its 11 seats being eyed by the Congress. Naresh Sharma, a sociology lecturer at Jammu University, says people in Jammu are upbeat about the Modi style of development. “People are very enthusiastic about Modi being the Prime Minster of India. He is, probably, the first leader from a national party who has attained this kind of fame in Jammu,” Sharma says. The Modi charisma appears to be uniting the party leadership in the rest of the state too, though to a lesser degree than in Jammu. “His style of functioning and inclusive development agenda has not just made him popular in Jammu but also in other parts of the state,” says BJP youth wing leader in Kashmir, Ashiq Hussain. Going by the aggressive campaign it has launched, the party clearly hopes to also open its account in the Kashmir valley in the coming assembly elections. That’s where Modi becomes a gamble – a hard line Hindu leader could mean the risk of losing some of the ground the BJP has gained in the Valley, but that might be a risk offset by the expected gains in Jammu. On the other hand, the Congress believes that the political situation in the state has changed a lot since the Amarnath land row of 2008. “The BJP hijacked the sentiments of people of Jammu in 2008 and managed to win 11 seats. But today, the situation is altogether different," said a Congress leader. Notwithstanding such brave statements, it is clear that the Congress party is apprehensive of Modi’s popularity in Jammu. Nothing else could have pushed its leaders to seek a pre-poll alliance either with its present coalition partner National Conference (NC), or Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), well before the scheduled elections in 2014, sources say. Congress insiders admit that if Jammu is swayed by Modi’s influence, it will really hamper their party’s performance in the Assembly elections. The Congress desperately wants to sweep the Jammu region and has been relying on the development plank of the present coalition government. In more trouble for the Congress, a bulk of its leaders are not in favour of a pre-poll alliance with the National Conference for 2014’s Assembly elections. In fact, the current dispensation with the National Conference is not working too, this was clear when AICC general secretary and in charge of Congress J&K affairs Ambika Soni chaired a party convention in Srinagar recently. Several local party workers complained of facing alienation and discrimination at the hands of leaders of its coalition partner. The party workers had complained to the visiting Congress leader that they were not being given due attention when they approached NC leaders with certain issues. The workers said as a result they felt alienated and discriminated against. In the face of a growing BJP and a troubled coalition with the NC, and with the prospect of having to find partners at the Centre and in J&K in 2014, the Kashmir headache has just become a tough one for the Congress. Modi’s big December rally in Jammu could be a signal of what’s ahead.