Invoking ‘love jihad’ appeared to have had a negative effect, as the Bharatiya Janata Party suffered a major setback in Assembly by-elections in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat, losing 13 of the 23 seats held by it. Red-faced BJP media managers tried to dissociate themselves from the highly polarised campaign in Uttar Pradesh under its Gorakhpur MP Yogi Adityanath. The party said it was the Samajwadi Party which “communalised’’ the run-up to the by-polls to its advantage.
Party president Amit Shah is scheduled to hold a meeting on Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh to analyse the causes for the defeat. He may look into selection of candidates in these two States and the lacunae on the ground.
After a spectacular showing in the Assembly and Lok Sabha polls in Rajasthan, the BJP has now conceded to the Congress three of the four seats where by-polls were held. Similarly, in Uttar Pradesh the party lost seven of the 10 seats it held, including Rohaniya in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Varanasi constituency which was contested by Apna Dal, its alliance partner. The absence of the Bahujan Samaj Party had made it a direct contest between the BJP and the SP.
Conceding that the party had suffered a “setback” and needed to introspect, BJP’s national spokesman Vijay Sonkar Shastri said Yogi Adityanath’s utterances were his “personal views,” which the party had condemned. “It is the Samajwadi Party which took advantage of the situation and polarised the voters.’’
“Assembly by-elections are based on the personality of individual candidates and local issues. People voted on local issues.”
The party disagreed with suggestions that the by-election results were a referendum on the 100 days’ performance of the BJP at the Centre.
The silver lining for the BJP is its entry in the West Bengal Assembly — it won the Basirhat Dakshin seat in North 24 parganas district. “People in West Bengal want a change from Trinamool and the CPI (M) and the BJP will provide that change,” said party secretary Shrikant Sharma.
