Assam Elections 2016: Why BJP is confident of coming to power

The xenophobia about illegal Bangladeshi migrants that led to a people’s movement in the late ’70s and early ’80s, spearheaded by the students, is still pervasive in Assam and indeed in the entire North-east. The constant fear of a demographic change which would reduce the Hindus to a minority in Assam has been playing out for the last 30 years and more. So the BJP’s nationalist pitch resonates in the state and has given the BJP-AGP-Bodoland People’s Party the headwind that is likely to spur the alliance to victory.

The BJP had long been eyeing Assam. During the agitation against illegal influx, leaders like Atal Bihari Vajpayee, LK Advani and Jaswant Singh would regularly visit the state and showed their solidarity with the people.

The RSS has also been quietly working in upper Assam in the tea garden areas. It has succeeded in breaking the Congress party’s stranglehold over the plantation labour votes. In the parliamentary elections of 2014, the BJP had won seven of the 14 seats from the state. The fresh faces that the party fielded from the tea garden community like Kamakhya Tasa and Rameswas Teli came up winners. Long-time Congress leader of the tea labour community, Pawan Singh Ghatowar, who was minister in the Manmohan Singh government, suffered a shocking defeat. The BJP graph had been steadily rising in Assam and the crowning glory would be forming a government for the first time in the largest state of the region. This would mean that the traditional Congress bastion in the North-east will now be under constant attack unless the party is able to counter the BJP.

While the RSS-BJP has broken the tea labour vote bank of the Congress, the rise of Badruddin Ajmal, the perfume baron and president of the All India United Democratic Front (AIDUF) had taken away the solid vote bank of the Muslim minority. While the BJP has the vote of the Assamese Hindus, Bengali Hindus, the thriving Marwari business and trading sections and the tribals, the Muslim vote is divided between AIUDF and the Congress.

Earlier, the minorities voted in large numbers. This time round the Assamese majority too have come out in equal numbers. In many of the Muslim-dominated constituencies in the second phase of polls, the figures were as high as 90 per cent. But no one is sure if the votes went to Ajmal or the Congress. While the AIUDF has been taking away votes from the Congress, the fear of BJP-AGP government has led to many of the Muslims getting back to the Congress fold. They realise that Ajmal, despite being their man, has a major business empire which extends to several states in India as well as in the Gulf region. As a businessman he will be wary of the BJP government at the Centre. He is vulnerable to pressure and the argument is many of the minorities believe it may be better to seek the protection of a national party like the Congress. No one really knows if the minorities have voted strategically and abandoned Ajmal. No one is sure.

Ajmal has already begun the blame game by saying that if the BJP wins, it will have an alliance with him. “If BJP wins because of division of secular votes, it is the Congress which will be responsible,” Ajmal posted on Twitter.

He also revealed that his party had approached the Congress for “some understanding…But Congress rejected our offer,” he said. “They are rather hell bent to divide secular votes.” It is well known that Congress Chief Minister, Tarun Gogoi, dislikes Ajmal and had once asked “Who is Ajmal, I don’t know him.’’ This even as the AIUDF leader was cashing in on the Congress vote bank.

After three terms in office, Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi is giving a strong fight to the BJP. While no one knows what the final results will be, it is unlikely that the Congress will be totally out of the picture. If it is able to get back a substantial share of minority votes, it will have a sizeable section of MLAs. The problem Gogoi is facing is that of incumbency, though he has run a good administration. There are corruption charges against his government.

Ironically, Himanta Biswa Sarma, allegedly one of the most corrupt ministers in Gogoi’s team, had defected to the BJP. Sarma is an asset to the party, as his personal popularity in the state is high, a minister who has always delivered on the poll front. Much of the credit of the BJP’s energetic campaign is thanks to Sarma. In fact, the man behind the Congress victory the last two elections was Sarma. He was once Gogoi’s blue-eyed boy and had come into the Congress as a protégé of former Chief Minister Hiteshwar Saikia.

The people of Assam want a change. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s talk of development is also music to young voters who are looking for opportunities. Yet, despite all this, Gogoi has run an energetic campaign. But the chant is for change and voters want to give the BJP a chance.

The BJP is promising to deliver on the sensitive issue of foreign nationals. The campaign focused on building a fence along the over 4,000 kilometre largely unprotected border with Bangladesh to stop the influx. The party has talked of preserving the cultural identity. The BJP’s Assam Vision Document 2016-2025 promised to bring in a new law to ensure that infiltrators do not get employment in the state whether in industry, business or any other agency employing illegal immigrants. The question is will this lead to a witch hunt and Muslim immigrants will be targeted, even those settled before March 1971.

According to the Assam accord signed between the Government of India and the student leaders, all Bangladeshi immigrants who were in Assam before the cut-off-date of March 24, 1971, will be regarded as Indian citizens.

This could create problems later if the BJP wins elections and brings in a new law. But for now this has pleased the Assamese who believe their jobs have been taken away by hard-working immigrants.

Though the buzz in Assam is that the BJP led alliance will win the elections, nothing is sure till the actual vote count is announced.

The author is a New Delhi-based senior journalist who had reported from Assam