Three months ahead of 2024 general elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi looks set to return to power, with an ever more swelling majority. The ambitious alliance stitched by Congress, the main opposition party – named the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) – has all but crumbled. Its leading PM candidate, Nitish Kumar of Janata Dal (United), has ditched to rejoin the BJP to take a record 9th time oath as chief minister of Bihar, a crucial state, central to India’s electoral calculus.
Why is the path to a third term for PM Modi proving to be a cake walk? And the opposition, instead of coalescing together, is falling apart when the final fight is to be announced?
First and foremost, Modi continues to command unprecedented popularity in all corners of India. Even in the states where BJP was trounced in state polls, like in Karnataka and Kerala, he enjoys an immense following. His charisma and following was evident when before the consecration ceremony of the just-inaugurated Ram Temple in Ayodhya, he had visited to perform pre-consecration rituals in these states.
The whole Ram Temple ushering-in exercise centered on the personality of Narendra Modi. It was perhaps for the first time in the history of India that a pivotal ritual like the installation of the statue of deity at a prominent Hindu temple was conducted at the hands of a person belonging to a low caste. Modi hails from an Other Backward Caste (OBC), and it was one the reasons that four shankracharyas (head priests) of four peeths boycotted the ceremony.
Travel to any Indian town, whether rural or urban, and the landscape will be littered and festooned with cutouts of Modi with Lord Rama, signaling a wave of increasing public admiration for him.
One line from Modi’s speech on the occasion – Dev se Ram; Ram se rashtra (from God to country, and from Ram to nation) – has reverberated in both the cautionary and celebratory commentary about the stature of Modi and the use of temples for his politics. Some saw in Modi’s words a direction towards an inclusive India: bridging the divides of religion, caste, creed and region of India. They also highlighted Modi’s phrasing of temple construction as not a moment of vijay (victory) but that of vinay (humility). In this narrative, Modi clearly comes up as a charioteer of a narrative that binds the whole nation in one thread. His colossal status has only been boosted further.
Travel to any Indian town, whether rural or urban, and the landscape will be littered and festooned with cutouts of Modi with Lord Rama, signaling a wave of increasing public admiration for him.
On the other hand, sections of Indian society that are critical of Modi and BJP mixing mythology, religion and politics find Modi’s appeal as alarm bells for the secular, constitutional principles of a democratic India. They see January 22, when Modi inaugurated Ram Temple, as the advent of a “Second Republic” that, if remains unchecked, will herald authoritarian autocracy, interspersed with intermittent anarchy and shrinking of already-dwindling rights of minorities like Muslims.
Linked with the image and person of Modi, another factor in favor of the BJP is the caste balance, that is tilting more and more towards the side of the saffron party.
But these concerns are quickly drowned out in the political landscape of India, and judging by the bolstering image of BJP and the dwarfing of the opposition into insignificance day by day, the next government in Delhi will be even more ominous.
Linked with the image and person of Modi, another factor in favor of the BJP is the caste balance, that is tilting more and more towards the side of the saffron party. Besides Modi, Amit Shah, his second in command and Home Minister of India, is an OBC. So are many chief ministers of BJP-ruled provinces, and key office-bearers of BJP. OBCs form about 45-60% of Indian electorates. Since 2012, BJP has focused on OBCs by fielding them in maximum numbers in all state and general elections. The vast majority of its state legislators and MPs today are OBCs.
In every state of India, all leading OBC leaders, barring Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, are from BJP. Last week, when Nitish Kumar, an OBC leader, returned to the BJP fold, it was all part of BJP’s scheme of things to bring OBCs of central India into its kitty. Now, only Yadavs (OBCs) of Samajwadi Party and Rashtriya Janata Dal in UP and Bihar have been left as rivals of BJP. Even urban Yadavs, say political pundits, have been voting for BJP and that both these parties – SP and RJD – are actually Muslim-dominated parties, backed by 20% Muslims each, as compared to 9 and 12% Yadavs. Muslims in opposite camps are always part of BJP’s political strategy and it reaps heavy electoral dividends by playing divisive politics and targeting Muslims.
While the BJP has been able to carve religious and caste equations to almost perfection, the opposition led by the Congress party neither has a clue about the glue that might keep the alliance united, nor does it have any plan to attract different caste groups. At the time of writing, only SP and Congress are in talks to contest the 2024 elections as allies. All other regional leaders like Mamata Banerjee of West Bengal, MK Stalin of Tamil Nadu and Naveen Patnaik of Odisha have announced to go solo in their respective states. Even in UP, there is news of bickering between SP and Congress over the seat-sharing formula.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi is marching on another India-wide march, Nyaya Yatra, to torpedo Modi’s return to PM office, but the support for Congress seems to slip with every state Gandhi is crossing
The Congress had pompously made Dalit leader Mallikarjun Kharge its president, with an eye to capture Dalit support. However, barring Kharge, the party has not projected any other Dalit leader to show that it is promoting Dalits. Moreover, the party has failed to strike an alliance deal with Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party which is the only party with the largest Dalit base. BSP’s core voters, Jatavs, are strewn in sufficient numbers in UP, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat and Maharashtra.
Jatavs have traditionally voted en masse for BSP. Many times, the margin of victory for a BJP candidate has been as much as the number of Jatavs who voted for the BSP candidate. The Congress has ignored even this importance of Jatav votes, making the road for BJP easier.
Meanwhile, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi is marching on another India-wide march, Nyaya Yatra, to torpedo Modi’s return to PM office, but the support for Congress seems to slip with every state Gandhi is crossing, most prominently Jharkhand, where his ally, CM Hemant Soren, has lost his seat and the Congress alliance is herding its legislators in a private resort to save the government.
On the other hand, Modi, with all the possible dangers of irreversibly transforming India's secular democracy into a Hindu nationalist republic, is sleepwalking towards another perch at the high table of Indian democracy.