BJP hopes for a hat-trick in Uttarakhand, but the party has not endeared itself to faujis and farmers

The party hopes the ‘successes’ of its pioneering Uniform Civil Code and the Silkyara tunnel rescue will outshine voters’ anger over the Agnipath scheme and Joshimath’s woes

Gathering during a public meeting addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi (Unseen) ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, in Rishikesh on April 11. | Photo Credit: ANI

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is aiming to win all five seats in Uttarakhand in the forthcoming Lok Sabha election for the third consecutive time, yet what may prove to be crucial is how such a historic victory will come about. The 24-year-old Himalayan State has been the first to bring a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in what the party sees as its success, as it does the rescue of 41 trapped workers from the collapsed tunnel in Silkyara.

Known for the Char Dham Yatra (the Badrinath-Kedarnath-Gangotri-Yamunotri temples), Uttarakhand gave the saffron party back-to-back victories in the previous two Lok Sabha elections (2014 and 2019) as well as in the previous two Assembly elections (2017 and 2022), which saw ‘Kamandal and Mandal’ politics combined astutely.

Two of the five Lok Sabha seats here — Nainital-Udham Singh Nagar, and Almora — are situated in Kumaon region. The remaining three — Haridwar, Tehri Garhwal, and Garhwal (Pauri) — are in the Garhwal region.

In the 2022 Assembly election, the Congress, which is also the largest Opposition party in the State, witnessed a comeback, but the grand old party has failed to pose a credible challenge to the BJP.

Senior Congress leaders, including Harish Rawat, are giving this pivotal election, which will decide the fate of Opposition in the State, a miss. Mr. Rawat is only campaigning for his son, Virendra (48), who making his debut as a candidate at Haridwar. Pitted against Mr. Virendra Rawat is the BJP’s Trivendra Rawat, a former Chief Minister of Uttarakhand. The constituency is a blend of upper caste, Scheduled Caste (SC), and Muslim voters.

The BJP’s “backroom boy”, Anil Baluni, is in the fray at Garhwal. After spending years in Delhi, he is back home in Pauri, hoping to cash in on what he calls the “third wave of Narendra Modi” to secure a clean sweep in a constituency. Voters here angry over the Union government’s Agnipath defence services recruitment scheme, and the mishandling of land subsidence in Joshimath. Uttarakhand is home to over 1.9 lakh former defence personnel, including 50,000 Army and war widows. The ‘fauji (soldier) vote’ plays an important role in any election in Uttarakhand.

Standing against Mr. Baluni, is the Congress’ former State chief, Ganesh Godial. The Congress has promised in its manifesto that it would quash the Agnipath scheme if voted to power.

In Tehri, the BJP’s Mala Rajya Lakshmi Shah, know as the Rani of Tehri, is campaigning to win for the fourth time since 2012. The first woman MP from the hill State, Ms. Shah’s challenger is not the Congress’ Jot Singh Gunsola but rather Bobby Panwar, president of the Uttarakhand Berozgaar Sangh, an association of unemployed persons, who is contesting as an independent candidate and is popular among youth as he promises to fight for education and jobs.

The SC reserved seat, Almora, is seeing an interesting fight between arch rivals Ajay Tamta of the BJP and Pradeep Tamta of the Congress. The two prominent SC faces are pitted against each other for the fifth time since 2002, with Mr. Ajay Tamta highlighting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pro-poor schemes, the biggest beneficiaries of which, he says, are SCs, Other Backward Classes (OBCs), and tribals. The Congress’ Mr. Pradeep Tamta, on the other hand, is highlighting cases of atrocities against Dalits in the State, where untouchability and other forms of caste-based discrimination still prevail.

The Minister of State for Defence Ajay Bhatt is once again contesting from the Nainital-Udham Singh Nagar constituency, which has a significant presence of Muslim and Sikh farmers. They are unhappy with the BJP over its handling of the farmers’ protest, and government action that resulted in violence in Haldwani.

Against Mr. Bhatt is the Congress’ Prakash Joshi, who avoids religion-based politics, and feels that Congress’ candidates are contesting on their own credentials and not “hiding behind the shield of Narendra Modi”.

In 2014, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) secured a vote share of 55.9% in Uttarakhand, and this rose to 61.7% in 2019.

In 2024, 83.21 lakh voters can exercise their franchise. The State votes on April 19, and the results will be announced on June 4.