- The Bharatiya Janata Party’s mindboggling victory in the recently concluded assembly elections announces loud and clear that the saffron brigade is marching ahead relentlessly without any formidable opposition to check and/or erect an obstacle along the way. In an extraordinary development, the BJP has retained power for an unprecedented seventh term brushing aside all predictions about voter fatigue and anti-incumbency. In fact, the BJP leadership simply turned the anti-incumbency on its head by inventing the term pro-incumbency during the duration of the election campaigning. Due credit should be accorded to BJP’s election machinery for functioning efficiently, proficiently, and relentlessly 24/7 with a single-point agenda of winning.
PC: Sameer Khan
- Trust me, none of the political parties have the motivation or focused attention required for the grueling and demanding electioneering the way BJP does. It is simply fascinating to observe how the BJP leadership and organizational structure goes about its task election after election. There is a common saying in Indian parlance that the head of the family sets the motion for everything, good or bad. Yatha Raja Tatha Praja. Look not far from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s emulation-worthy work schedule over the last couple of decades. The PM puts in close to 16-18 hours of untiring work in not only running the country but also finding enough time to navigate the party’s fortunes is simply astonishing. No wonder, the party diligently follows in his footsteps.
- When the PM himself sets the tone, what motivation you may require to go about accomplishing your tasks? As such, there’s no other way to put it across: BJP’s record haul in Gujarat is directly proportional to PM Modi’s unsparing efforts over the past few years to reach out to voters. His high-energy campaign, visiting Gujarat week after week, during which he kept presenting industrial projects, development schemes, talked up global recognition of various kinds, and give big-ticket ideas for the future, convinced voters that despite six successive assembly victories, BJP’s double engine government at Centre and state still has much more to offer. The narrative is definitely working in some of the biggest states like UP and now Gujarat.
PC: SUHAS PALSHIKAR, DEVESH KUMAR
- However, what has the opposition achieved in stalling the BJP’s upswing over the last few years? None whatsoever. The charisma and unparalleled pulling power of Modi vis-à-vis voters are too overwhelming for the opposition who keep failing to project a cohesive strategy against the BJP mascot. The opposition is in complete disarray offering no better than tired welfarism and freebies as a counter. In Gujarat, Congress and AAP could only promise the beaten-to-death welfarism and freebies which BJP tactfully neutralized by appealing to Gujarati pride. Mind you, for PM Modi and Amit Shah, this triumph will taste sweeter than many earlier ones in Gujarat, having finally chased down Madhavsinh Solanki’s 149-seat victory in 1985 with 156 now.
