A victory as a defeat for the BJP: 10 lessons from the 2024 elections
The results are out.
With 16 MPs of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and 12 MPs of the Janata Dal (United), the NDA looks set to form the government again.
However, both kingmakers will work hard to secure the agreements denied to them in the last 10 years. Apparently, with cues from the India bloc too, they are in no hurry to come forward and shake hands with outgoing Prime Minister Narendra Modi – until they get their due.
Both Chandrababu Naidu and Nitish Kumar may demand ‘special status’ and additional central grants for their respective states.
It is being said that one of the two kingmakers has also asked for the Home Department.
The precipitous decline – or even destruction – of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) in Odisha, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in Bihar and the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) in Andhra Pradesh has cast a shadow over the future of these regional parties.
The RJD failed to lead the Opposition to victory in Bihar, while exit polls and even Prashant Kishore had correctly predicted both Odisha and Bihar, where the NDA – especially the BJP in Odisha – gained impressive leads.
However, in West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee thwarted the BJP’s ambition of winning 25 or more seats, reducing its tally from the 18 it won in 2019 to 12 this time.
Here are some of the key findings — and some questions still hanging in the air:
1. This election promises to revive the politics of coalitions and consensus building. So-called ‘weak’ prime ministers who headed coalition governments such as P V Narasimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Dr Manmohan Singh have historically led effective governments and have implemented more reforms and taken more important policy decisions than the so-called ‘strong government’ led by Narendra Modi in the last 10 years.
Can a weakened Modi revive the Vajpayee spirit of NDA-1? That is the question.
2. Will Narendra Modi be able to run the coalition government successfully? This is a doubt that most people have.
Temperamentally, they may find this difficult, as they have worked as an individual for 10 years.
Will the allies support Modi or any new leader of the BJP? Will some allies go to the opposition?
Rahul Gandhi said that the clear message of this election is that people do not want to see Modi and Amit Shah at the helm of the government. And what will happen if both of them take charge of the government? This question is also floating in the air.
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3. In any case, Prime Minister Modi has been let down by the voters.
Though he won from Varanasi by a wafer-thin margin of about 1.5 lakh votes, the loss of nearly half of the seats won by the BJP in Uttar Pradesh in 2019 is a blow that neither the PM nor Bulldozer Baba will be able to recover from quickly.
The prime minister’s claim that he is an ‘avatar’ sent by God to do meaningful work has not impressed voters. At the very least, his authority has been eroded and his stature diminished.
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4. Observers believe the results have restored the balance between the RSS and the BJP. BJP president JP Nadda’s surprise claim in the middle of the election that the party no longer needs the RSS will be put to test, as unconfirmed reports suggest the RSS favours the election of a new leader other than Modi.
5. BJP did not get the expected benefit from the Ram Mandir construction which was completed with much fanfare in January.
In fact, the BJP even lost the Faizabad seat (which includes Ayodhya) and contrary to popular belief, Hindu voters in UP were not impressed enough by the Ram Mandir issue to give BJP candidates a big enough margin of victory.
This setback could slow down the Hindutva project or even halt it temporarily.
Some believe that the results in UP are a revenge for Yogi Adityanath as there was speculation that he would be sidelined if the BJP came back with a huge majority. However, the results have weakened Yogi Adityanath’s political position even within the BJP and his future will be watched with interest.
6. Bharat Block was considered almost dead in the Hindi speaking states. However, it performed unexpectedly well in Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, but not so well in Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh and Himachal Pradesh.
Even in Bihar the alliance did not perform as expected.
Why can Hindu majoritarianism work in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and the hill states, but not in Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh? This will puzzle commentators for a long time.
7. The India Bloc was reeling under enormous difficulties, with central agencies harassing its leaders, two of its chief ministers arrested on flimsy corruption charges and the Income Tax Department freezing the bank accounts of the Congress.
Add to this a hostile media, with TV channels constantly mocking and ridiculing the opposition.
As a result, very few people gave the opposition alliance any chance against the resource-rich BJP and its election machine and IT cell.
However, the opposition surprised everyone by putting up a strong fight and outsmarting the BJP with sharp and funny videos on social media.
8. This was the first election in which a party’s manifesto became an election issue. The Congress manifesto successfully reached out to the people and spoke of issues such as threats to the Constitution, the need for increased equality and redistribution of wealth.
Bharat Bloc also spoke of threats to democracy and sought to educate people about regressive taxation and arbitrary tax reliefs, crony capitalism, etc. – issues that are rarely addressed by political parties nowadays.
And ironically, Prime Minister Modi’s constant criticism of the manifesto helped generate curiosity.
9. This more equal outcome is also likely to ensure a more balanced, functional Parliament with a stronger Opposition in the Lok Sabha.
10. Elections, as described by Pratap Bhanu Mehta in his article Indian Expresshas broken the myth that BJP is a different kind of party, a political party which is less corrupt and more honest than other parties.