BJP back in the game in Hindi heartland

Shahira Naim in Lucknow

British Prime Minister Harold Wilson had famously said: “A week is a long time in politics.” The saying has proved to be more than apt for the BJP in Uttar Pradesh during the past month. The saffron party that had been teetering on the brink of a disaster seems to be back in the game. The Balakot airstrike on a JeM militant training camp in Pakistan, followed by the verbal bombardment by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP president Amit Shah and Chief Minister Yogi Aditynath, has managed to change the narrative in Uttar Pradesh ahead of the crucial Lok Sabha election. 

The development has caught the SP-BSP alliance off guard. What was being perceived as a smooth sail for the alliance now appears to be an uphill task. Worst still, the major casualty in such a changed scenario has been the truth and the basic democratic spirit of agreeing to disagree with one’s opponent. Speaking to people across the spectrum makes it apparent that suddenly there is no middle ground. One either agrres with the BJP government’s position or is an anti-national. 

It is in this context that BSP supremo Mayawati has been grappling to counter the changed narrative. Last week, she held a crucial party meeting to seek feedback on the implications of the airstrike from grassroots workers and is now reworking her strategy accordingly for the Lok Sabha polls.

Leaders of the SP-BSP alliance are treading very carefully in this altered scenario. Associates close to them admit that both Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav are acutely aware that even the slightest of faux pas or an insinuation about the airstrike or military action ordered by Prime Minister Modi could seal their fortune for good.

They are still working on a counter strategy which will question Modi’s action without hurting the emotions unleashed by the BJP offensive.  The fear of the opposition leaders is largely true. Vernacular journalist from Maharajganj in eastern Uttar Pradesh Deepak Sharan Srivastava admits that starting with the Pulwama incident, the airstrike and the incidents that followed the scenario has altered. 

“Suddenly, people who were earlier angry with the unfulfilled promises of the BJP government’s on its development agenda, have backtracked. Maharajganj district headquarters is yet to be connected through the railways. Till a month ago, people of Maharajganj were angry that the sitting BJP MP,  Pankaj Choudhary, despite his fifth term there, has not fulfilled his promise to connect the district through the railways.”

Now the same people, who have been very vocal about this demand for development, have gone silent in the face of the rising jingoism and war hysteria, says Srivastava. Mamta Singh, who works with an NGO in Lucknow, says after the airstrike a group of citizens had decided to hold a candle-lit vigil in a public place to urge common citizens to gather there and support a call for saying no to war. “I was surprised when many people, including activists, teachers and lawyers, who were invited for the vigil, became aggressive and accused the citizens who took the initiative of being anti-national. 

“‘Instead of supporting the Modi government in strongly attacking Pakistan, you people are taking the side of the enemy by asking for peace which is a betrayal of national interests’, they argued. Their reaction spoke volumes about the changed atmosphere in favour of the BJP,” argues Mamta. 

This perception is confirmed by two contrasting opinion polls. A Times Now-VMR survey report released at the end of January 2019 showed that the NDA was in for a shock in the country’s most political significant state of Uttar Pradesh. The survey showed that the BJP’s tally was likely to slump to just 27 out of the total 80 seats. 

This prediction was a major reversal as in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections the BJP had won 73 seats from Uttar Pradesh along with its ally Apna Dal, facilitating its majority government at the centre. 

The survey claimed that the BJP’s vote share was also expected to be dip by 4.4 per cent. The SP-BSP alliance was said to be the main beneficiary of the BJP’s declining fortunes. The survey gave the SP-BSP alliance as many as 51 seats as against the five seats it had won in 2014. The Congress was not expected to win more than the two seats allocated to it by the SP-BSP alliance. 

However, after the airstrike, the India TV-CNX Opinion Polls, released on March 5, shows that the saffron party has made significant recovery since February 28. 

The India TV and CNX opinion poll, the first since the Pulwama terror attack and airstrike, tried to gauge the mood of the nation through the voters in Uttar Pradesh.

It predicts that the BJP has made significant recovery, so much so that if the Lok Sabha elections were held immediately the BJP was expected to gain 12 additional seats in Uttar Pradesh and end up winning 41 of total 80 seats. According to the survey, the BJP’s vote share stands at 40.95 per cent, just two per cent less its 2014 vote share of 42.63 per cent. The SP-BSP alliance will lose 14 seats in the post airstrike scenario, taking its tally to 35 seats. However, some analysts differ with this evaluation. They point out that once the elections are announced and the opposition leaders fan out in the hinterland exposing how the BJP government had managed to distract them by putting the development agenda on the back burner, the narrative may change once again. “It is unlikely that the Muslims, Dalits and OBCs, who have been neglected and harassed under the present regime, will suddenly switch sides,” feels Manoj Singh, who runs a local web channel in Gorakhpur.

At the moment, it is difficult to say who would have the last word or vote for that matter.