Hardly a year before the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP faces stiff challenges in its populous strongholds amid a largely symbolic expansion in some regions like the northeast, Bengal and Odisha where the party had no presence earlier.
This, analysts feel, may ensure a substantial dip in the ruling party’s 2019 tally, even if rival Congress does not come close to it.
“The expansion in the northeast is symbolically important as a Hindu nationalist party’s influence spread beyond its core regions, but it does not help the BJP’s Lok Sabha tally as the states are small,” says political analyst Sajjan Kumar, a doctorate in politics from JNU who has covered many polls. “The losses, however, are likely to pile up in the northern, western and central Indian states which have large populations and have seen BJP sweeps in 2014.”
A look at recent polls seems to bear him out.
In 2014, the BJP had won all the seats in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand and most seats in UP, MP, Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Jharkhand and Maharashtra. These states together account for over 250 seats, and it is here that the losses are likely in 2019. The Haryana government has faced accusations of poor governance and Rajasthan seems to be facing anti-incumbency, if recent by-poll results are any indication.
The BJP’s recent electoral gains have been in the northeast, with Tripura as a feather in its cap. But the state has just two Lok Sabha seats. In fact, apart from Assam, which has 14 Lok Sabha seats, the entire northeast has just nine seats in the Lower House.
In the last West Bengal assembly polls and the Odisha panchayat polls of February 2017, the BJP replaced the left and the Congress, respectively, as the second largest party. Yet, it is well behind the regional players, namely the Trinamool Congress and Biju Janata Dal. Vote percentage gains translate into substantial seat gains only after a critical mass is reached, and the BJP may not yet have breached that mark.
In the February 2018 by-polls in the Uluberia Lok Sabha and Noapara Assembly seats in Bengal, the BJP stood second but lost to the TMC by massive margins. In Odisha’s recent Bijepur assembly by-poll too, the BJD trounced the BJP -- which stood second -- by a heavy margin.
“We maximised gains in our core regions in 2014. From there, we can only fall. We have to somehow balance this through expansions and new alliances in our peripheral regions,” a BJP insider told The Hindu .
However, there is little evidence of the party expanding in South India, apart from a rise in vote percentage in Kerala in the 2016 Assembly polls to 15%, from a mere 6% in 2011. However, winning seats would require another huge leap from here.
The Telugu Desam Party’s parting of ways around a discourse of injustice to Andhra Pradesh is also not good news for the BJP.
The biggest challenge for the BJP is the potential SP-BSP alliance in UP. The alliance can corner Muslim (19%), Dalit (21%) and Yadav (8.7%) votes in large chunks. This is likely to result in massive seat losses for the BJP, which alone won 71 out of 80 seats here the last time.
While the BJP won 42% votes in UP in the last Lok Sabha polls, the combined vote percentage of the SP and BSP matched it. Add the Congress’ share and a grand “secular” coalition can come close to winning half the votes polled and stay well ahead of the BJP.
