Truth of wave-less elections

Less than a week remains for first phase of polling. Parties have declared candidates for most of the seats. Congress has also announced its manifesto. 

Both BJP and Congress have sealed alliances and finalised seat arrangements. 

While BJP has coined the slogan Modi hai to Mumkin hai and Main bhi Chowkidaar, Congress is banking on the NYAY scheme. In the process to retain power, BJP faces many challenges. 

Congress has released its manifesto and is promising Rs 72,000 pa to 5 crore poorest of poor families, besides filling up 22 lakh government jobs and increasing guaranteed employment under NREGA from 100 to 150 days. 

This has put pressure on BJP to release its manifesto and come up with concrete plans to negate some Congress promises. 

In the 2014 general elections, BJP had announced its manifesto on the day of first phase of polling. It can’t wait for that long this time, as there has never been so much buzz about a poll manifesto in elections in India.

The BJP needs to recreate the Modi magic of 2014 in 2019. BJP benefitted from a Presidential-style election in 2014 where 27 per cent voters supported the party, just because Modi was the prime ministerial candidate.  

The opposition through strategic alliances, especially in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand, is trying to keep the elections focused on local issues and on the performance of MPs.

It is hoping to exploit the anti-incumbency against MPs. Neither Congress nor any other party has officially announced their prime ministerial candidate. 

This is the same formula, which Congress used effectively in the 2018 state elections of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan.

The alliances in UP and Bihar are trying to convert the elections into a caste-based affair, rather than focus on development, which trumped caste equations in 2014. 

BJP is targeting beneficiaries of various government schemes, especially Jan Dhan, Ujjwala, PM Awas Yojana, Ayushman and Mudra, to coax them to vote for the party. 

It claims to have touched the lives of most households in India through one or the other scheme. But beneficiaries don’t necessarily translate into votes. We have seen this in recent state elections. MP was the best performing state under PM Awas Yojana and Top 5 in Ujjwala. Yet Shivraj Singh Chouhan lost the elections. 

There has been an aspirational hike in India. The poor and downtrodden are not easily swayed by the schemes as they feel they have been deprived of these benefits for long and whatever the government has doled out to them is their birth right. 

By just hoping that beneficiaries will vote for the party may not work; by this logic no government would have ever lost. People voted out Manmohan Singh in 2014 even after announcing one of the biggest farm loan waivers in India’s history and implementing path breaking schemes as NREGA. 

The Modi government is carrying out a media blitz, wherein newspapers are flooded with advertisements, running into many pages. 

The problem with newspaper ads is not many people pay attention to it. Additionally, majority of the target voters of schemes/beneficiaries, the poor and downtrodden, don’t read newspapers. 

The BJP will need to rely on other mediums like social media and WhatsApp to disseminate information about its achievements. 

The party today has most MPs, MLAs and even councillors. It is ruling the highest number of states along with its allies. This leads to what call be called triple anti-incumbency. BJP state governments, in the past, have benefitted by passing the blame of its failures on the Congress central government.

This strategy has been efficiently used by Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Gujarat BJP governments over the past one-and-a-half decades.

In most state elections after 2014, the BJP blamed opposition for not utilising funds released by the Modi government and won many states. Now it’s not going to be that easy. NDA-ruled states can’t blame the Centre and Modi can’t blame states where BJP is in power for not fulfilling his manifesto promises.

The party needs to devise strategies to negate this triple anti-incumbency. It has denied tickets to 31 per cent sitting MPs, as per last count. 

By doing this, the party blames sitting MPs for non-performance and also hard sells the fact that it is proactive and won’t tolerate such MPs. BJP hopes that since many MPs are lightweights (first timers who won in the Modi wave), replacing them won’t lead to big dissidence.

A candidate needs significantly higher resources to contest a Lok Sabha seat compared to a Vidhan Sabha seat. So, unless the rebel is lapped up by another party, his/her chances of contesting as independent are low. 

Another issue is that there is no wave in favour of the BJP, like in 2014. Also, there is no wave against the BJP, like witnessed against the Congress in 2014. 

The party is trying to convert a wave-less election into a wave in favour of Modi, through campaigns like Modi hai to Mumkin hai and Main bhi Chowkidaar. 

It is being helped by a hapless opposition, which has yet to come up with any slogan/theme. The Pulwama attack and Surgical Strike 2.0 has been able to reverse the fortunes of BJP, according to opinion polls, also giving a boost to Modi’s popularity.

The issue is catching up in BJP strong hold pockets, North, Centre and West. However, it will be a big challenge to keep up this momentum. 

The Congress manifesto points on amendment of AFSPA and repeal of sedition have given BJP an opportunity to keep the matter hot.

To sum up, an election like 2019 is very difficult to predict. While BJP hopes for an outcome like 1971, opposition hopes to see a 1977 verdict. 

Author is a political analyst