Message in the verdict

The splendid showing by the BJP is definitely a huge endorsement of its development agenda and total negation of the obstructionist politics

March 13, 2017 12:15 am | Updated 12:33 am IST

“ The BJP has emerged as a true national party of the common man.” BJP supporters and workers celebrating the Assembly election results at the party headquarters in New Delhi.PTI

“ The BJP has emerged as a true national party of the common man.” BJP supporters and workers celebrating the Assembly election results at the party headquarters in New Delhi.PTI

By completely rejecting the politics of negativism adopted by the Congress and its allies, the people in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand have hugely endorsed the historic demonetisation drive to curb the twin evils of black money and corruption. At the same time, the verdict of the Assembly elections in these States shows that the people are in full sync with the National Democratic Alliance’s development agenda of ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas’.

The election results have shown that the ‘Modi magic’ continues unabated. The charisma of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the political stratagem of Amit Shah have proved to be too good for the Bharatiya Janata Party’s political opponents to throw a spanner in the BJP’s unstoppable march as a true pan-India party. With some political observers describing the just-concluded elections in five States as the semi-finals round for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP is confident that the NDA will comfortably clinch the final too.

Response from rivals

While the people once again displayed their wisdom and dismissed the opportunistic alliance of the Samajwadi Party and the Congress in U.P., and also voted in favour of the BJP in Uttarakhand, a similar kind of maturity and grace was lacking from the BJP’s political rivals. Instead of accepting the mandate for what it is, the leaders of some of the political parties mocked the people’s choice and charged the BJP with polarising the elections in U.P. Does this mean that all those who voted for the BJP have suddenly become communal, but were secular earlier?

One leader went to the extent of outrageously attributing the BJP’s historic win to the tampering of Electronic Voting Machines. Can anything be more illogical or puerile?

Apart from the Prime Minister’s magnetism, the dedication and hard work of the rank and file of the party and the numerous pro-poor, pro-farmer and pro-women schemes of the NDA government contributed to the BJP’s win.

The spectacular performance of the BJP in the Hindi heartland against the backdrop of the game-changing decision to invalidate high-value currency is all the more sweet since many political and media pundits treated the elections as a referendum on demonetisation. The glee on the faces of the critics of demonetisation must be lost, as their assumption that it would spell disaster for the BJP has been proved wrong. Instead of ‘ votebandi ’, it was total and overwhelming support for the war against corruption and black money.

Almost in every election from the Panchayat to the Lok Sabha after November 8, people have unambiguously endorsed demonetisation. Be it the by-elections to the Lok Sabha or Assemblies, or the series of municipal elections in Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh and Chandigarh, people have supported the BJP post-demonetisation.

The mandate in U.P. clearly showed the mood of the nation — people preferred the leadership, credibility and experience of Prime Minister Modi to the unprincipled SP-Congress alliance and the inexperience of its leaders. The results reflect the endorsement of three MODIs — Mood of Developing India, Making of Developed India, and the leadership of Mr. Modi.

Since 2014, the Prime Minister has changed the mindset of the people. They are now giving top priority to development and treating it as the new religion. Mr. Modi proved to be the greatest unifier of all sections in the country while exposing the real face of the pseudo-secularists.

The groundswell of support to the BJP reflects the fact that several pro-poor schemes launched by the NDA government are yielding dividends at the grassroots level. Schemes such as the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, under which LPG connections are given to BPL families, have made a huge impact in U.P. and elsewhere. Overall, 1,89,07,427 connections were given all over the country till March 10, 2017. Similarly, 6,53,32,419 loans were sanctioned under the Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana, which provides micro credit of up to ₹10 lakh to small entrepreneurs.

Support across sections

With a huge increase in the vote share of the BJP in U.P. — from 15% in 2012 to about 40% now — the results show that the Modi-led BJP has won the confidence of various sections, including the minorities, Dalits and backward classes across U.P. It is obvious that Muslims across U.P. also supported the BJP in good numbers, as no party has got such a huge majority in the State since 1980.

The unprincipled SP-Congress alliance, the personal attacks on the Prime Minister by the BJP’s rivals, poor governance, lack of development, and the side-lining of SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav have apparently not gone down well with voters in U.P. The BJP juggernaut also decimated the Bahujan Samaj Party, which was a formidable force. The BSP’s caste and communal politics and its corrupt image cost the party dearly in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls and again now.

Anti-incumbency apparently played its part in Punjab. However, it was a remarkable performance by the BJP in Manipur where its vote share increased from 2.12% in 2012 to over 34% now. Similarly, in Uttarakhand, it went up from 33.13% in 2012 to over 45% now. The inroads made by the party in the Northeastern States — Assam earlier and now Manipur — is noteworthy.

The Congress was so desperate in U.P. that it readily accepted the SP’s invitation to join hands after having declared Sheila Dikshit as the chief ministerial candidate. This kind of opportunism certainly did not go well with the people and added to the existential crisis that the Congress is facing. In fact, political observers are crediting the victory of the Congress in Punjab solely to the image of former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh and not to Rahul Gandhi. That in itself casts a long shadow on the future of the current Congress leadership and the policies it has pushed in recent years.

Interestingly, the Aam Aadmi Party, which hoped to spread its wings, could not make significant inroads because of its cheap politics and lacklustre performance in Delhi.

The splendid showing by the BJP is a huge endorsement of its development agenda and total negation of the obstructionist politics. The results have shown that BJP has established supremacy in around 60% of the constituencies that went to polls.

A big message from this round of elections is that the BJP has emerged as a true national party of the common man, a huge shift from being viewed only as a nationalist party in the past.

M. Venkaiah Naidu is Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Urban Development, Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation, Government of India

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.