VIEWPOINT
AMITABH SHUKLA
An anti-Congress wave seems to
have engulfed parts of North and Central India . Coming
five months before the Lok Sabha polls, there seems to be ominous signs for the
grand old party.
Given the outcome in four States
which together send 72 members to the Lok Sabha, the big picture looks
extremely worrisome for the Congress. For a journalist, it is difficult to take
a position on the outcome of a poll. But coming as it is just before the Lok
Sabha polls, I can now vouch for the fact that only a miracle can now help
Congress come to power for the third time in a row. And miracles do not happen
in electoral politics.
Sometime ago, I had written in
these columns that the results would indicate which way the political wind is
blowing. Indeed it has. In the 2009 polls, Congress had a distinct edge,
getting 41 members elected from these States while the BJP had to be content
with only 29 seats. Clearly, percentage wise the size of Congress victory and
its margin over BJP in these four States was more or less similar to the one it
had at the national level where it formed the Government.
An analysis of the outcome in the
Assembly polls in these four States would suggest that in 2014 polls, BJP could
easily cross the figure of 45 from these four States and would be slightly less
than 50. The size of its victory in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh is quite big
and it would reflect in the Lok Sabha results as well. That would be of
tremendous help to the party as it desperately seeks more numbers from Bihar
and Uttar Pradesh to make Narendra Modi the Prime Minister in place of Manmohan
Singh.
A quick analysis of the results
of the Assembly polls will give BJP 22 seats in Rajasthan, five seats each in
Chhattisgarh and Delhi and 17 seats
in Madhya Pradesh which takes the tally to an impressive 49. This is 20 seats
more than 29 it got in the 2009 polls. Obviously, all this would add up to the
numbers when UPA and NDA sit together and do the arithmetic after the results
of 2014 are out in May.
Even if we do not look at the
Assembly results from the prism of the bigger battle to be fought in a few
weeks from now, the outcome could perhaps be a watershed in Indian politics.
After a decade and a half, Congress lost the polls in a tsunami which blew Delhi
apart. The numbers of the anti-Congress votes, including both BJP and Aam Aadmi
Party, was too high for the party to even pose a semblance of fight.
The result of Delhi
is significant as it is not a state which sends merely 7 MPs to the Lok Sabha
but indicates a trend in the urban areas of the country. In the 2009 polls, the
urban areas of the country, voted for the Congress in a big way and this
included Delhi also. Now, the tide
seems to have reversed. Delhi shows
how urban India
is extremely angry and disappointed with Congress.
Of course, AAP has done
remarkably well and pushed Congress to a distant third position. This shows how
the youth of the Capital are disappointed with the existing system of
governance and want an overhaul. But given the fact that AAP has little or no
presence outside Delhi and has
little time to prepare for the Lok Sabha polls, the votes of this section
(potential AAP supporters) could well go into the kitty of Narendra Modi. The
Gujarat Chief Minister could get votes of the youth, anti-establishment
sections and what are called the floating or non committed voters as he has
taken the same posturing and position vis-à-vis the Congress which Arvind
Kejriwal had done in Delhi . Opinion
polls have already indicated that the section which wants Kejriwal as the chief
minister of Delhi also wants Modi
as the Prime Minister.
For the last over a decade,
Congress had a firm grip on Delhi .
For the first time, some of its staunchest supporters — people in unauthorised
colonies, JJ colonies and areas in East and Outer Delhi voted overwhelmingly
against it. This indicates how strong the wave was and it was largely due to
multiple anti-incumbency, corruption at high level both in Delhi and Central
Governments, Commonwealth Games fiasco, inflation and of course the acts of
omission and commission of Central Government. The message of Delhi
is loud and clear for the rest of the country as well.
Madhya Pradesh is another case
study. I do not know how badly Congress leader and the then chief minister
Digvijay Singh ruled Madhya Pradesh that the state has now completely gone out
of its control. Perhaps in their inner party introspection, the party should
ask Digvijay Singh what did he exactly do or did not do for 10 years which made
people abhor his party.
Many think that Madhya Pradesh is
going the Tamil Nadu or West Bengal way where Congress
has been finished for good.
Chhattisgarh was a close call but
BJP finally managed to get through convincingly in the end. But to do better in
Lok Sabha polls, Raman Singh will also have to cater to the upwardly mobile sections
also who are not bothered by government subsidies and freebies. He should also look at the aspirations of
those who want a better life, better infrastructure and better opportunities
and if you do not address those, you run the risk of annoying them.
Similarly in Rajasthan, Ashok
Gehlot emptied his coffers for several anti-poverty schemes. For the urban
areas, he only focussed on Jaipur. But anti incumbency, lack of ideas of
governance, lack of new schemes and also the prevailing undercurrent at the
national level did him in. Even in 2008 assembly polls in Rajasthan Congress
barely managed to touch the halfway mark of 100 through inducements. This time,
eclipse was written all over when Congress went into campaign.
The lessons of 2013 are obvious.
But 72 of the 545 seats in Lok Sabha can give you a broad idea not the actual
result in a country as vast and demographically diverse as India .
But what seems to be certain is that BJP is on an upswing and Congress has
clearly lost the momentum. (December 9, 2013)
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