Modi wave, Khattar’s work, micro-campaign led to win

Pradeep Sharma

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 23

The “Modi wave” and Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s “magic” of good governance has given the BJP its best-ever performance in the Lok Sabha elections, providing it a needed morale booster in the run-up to the Haryana Assembly elections later this year.

In fact, the big wins for the saffron party’s candidates, who defeated Congress stalwarts, including former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, former Union Minister Kumari Selja, state Congress president Ashok Tanwar, former Speaker Kuldeep Sharma and former state minister Ajay Yadav, is apparently an offshoot of the “Modi wave” and Khattar’s style of functioning which relied heavily on ‘zero tolerance’ to corruption and ‘sab ka saath, sabka vikas’.

“The ‘Modi wave’ was certainly a factor in our massive victory as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s development and nationalist agenda stood us in good stead. Moreover, our performance at the national and state level on the development front, coupled with people’s disenchantment with the dynastic politics, especially in Haryana, were another reasons for our landslide victory,” Khattar said here today.

BJP sources said the massive victory margins, in couple of cases over 5 lakh, were the result of the combination of a variety of factors like poll micromanagement, development agenda and the systemic change brought in by the BJP in the state in the last about five years.

Trends indicated that the polarisation of the urban and non-Jat votes in favour of the BJP played a significant role in the wins. This is particularly true of Jatland seats of Sonepat and Rohtak from where Hooda and his son Deepender Hooda, respectively, tasted defeat, delivering a severe blow to their political ambitious in the run-up to Assembly polls.

“The people of Haryana, especially Sonepat and Rohtak, have taught Hoodas a lesson for their alleged role in the violent Jat quota agitation of February 2016. Hooda’s 10-year misrule has also contributed to his crushing defeat in Sonepat,” Finance Minister Capt Abhimanyu told The Tribune.

The Congress bigwigs’ charisma was no match for the BJP’s poll micromanagement (through panna pramukhs whereby local leaders were made in charge of every page of the voter list).