Among the pitches set by the Prime Minister of India in his historic third term, one of the most prominent is “One Nation, One Election”. The pitch finds a chorus and consonance among the fans and followers of PM Modi, to admit it matter-of-factly. However, the recent focus for the entire political machinery was the crucial polls in Haryana and the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. Leading up to these elections, some political pundits declared the mood and mandate to be firmly against Modi’s leadership. Meanwhile, certain media outlets started reading obituaries for “Modi magic,” which they claimed had waned post the 2024 general elections.
Key takeaways from poll results of Haryana and Jammu & Kashmir
One can’t gaslight and ruse the voter: Not all, at all times! The electorate, as an entity, has learned to discern perception from reality. They can no longer be swayed by the narratives pushed by either side of the political spectrum. Voters see through poll promises, the facts of the matter, and the earnestness of the leader and their party against the deliverables made in other states.
Time is ripe to let go of the troll armies: The highly vaunted and venerated trolls of X (formerly Twitter), the professional pollsters or any other form of media do not make a mark on the electorate, except for inflating the costs of elections. These redundant but glorified trolls are cashing in on the apprehensions of insecure political parties as freelancers, to cuss, diss and traduce their adversaries and alternate voices. However, the BJP must not flout this learning that it is the welfarism, governance and stratagem of PM Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah, alongside the galvanising efforts of their supporters on the ground, that ensure delivery to the last man, not exorbitantly paid Twitter trolls.
Events don’t win you elections, organisations do: The premature and unwarranted exultation during the Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, and now Haryana polls, even before the final numbers were out, paints a gloomy picture. It’s a striking example of how the Congress manages to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Instead of focusing on election strategies to ensure voter turnout, Congress leaders indulge in all sorts of wacky, loony, and juvenile behaviour, rather than keeping their cards close to their chests until the counting is over. Media hype and social media buzz emanated by events, campaigns and roadshows don’t win elections. Organisational structure does.
The grand old party may have the ammunition of anti-incumbency against the long-ruling BJP, which helps it create a flutter, but it doesn’t have the maturity to absorb that thrust and sustain it till the results are declared.
The Inexorable Modi Juggernaut: The BJP under the stewardship of PM Modi is unrelenting in its commitment to expand geographically and electorally. Beating all odds, ranging from precedented history to anti-incumbency to organisational complacency, the PM Modi-led BJP not only surpassed the magic number in Haryana but also inflated its tally with regards to the seat count and vote share.
As senior journalist Rahul Shivshankar noted in his recent commentary on the poll results, “For the record, Haryana is the 11th state where the BJP has returned to power, cementing its status as the natural party of governance. This is no mean feat considering the Congress hasn’t been re-elected in any state for at least a decade.”
In Jammu & Kashmir too, the BJP emerged as the party with the highest vote share. Few could have predicted that the BJP would narrowly lose Gurez in Baramulla by a mere 1,132 votes – a constituency that is 98 per cent Muslim, where the BJP previously lacked any foothold and which was once known as a hotbed of terrorist activity. In the 2014 Rajpora assembly election, the BJP candidate secured a paltry 672 votes. This time, in the same constituency, the BJP candidate garnered 5,554 votes, finishing third. The BJP has outperformed the JKNC in vote share, disrupting the traditional bipolar contest between two established regional parties and thereby changing the entire political contour. Clearly, the BJP has made significant inroads in the Valley.
Hindu Voter Consolidation Against Caste Census: The Haryanvi dialect is known for being coarse and colloquial. However, people across castes, creeds, and sects greet each other with “Ram-Ram,” exhibiting uncanny kindness and affection. The BJP’s success in bagging 21 out of 25 OBC-dominated seats, increasing its tally by 3 in the SC reserved seats, and most crucially retaining 15 of the 30 seats in the Jat belt highlights a trend of Hindu voter consolidation against the brazen Muslim appeasement by the Congress and its allies. This seemingly finds consonance and endorsement in likes of the recent appeals made by UP CM Yogi Adityanath, PM Modi and RSS Sarsanghachalak Mohan Bhagwat, who have urged Hindus to unite beyond societal labels and divisions. This will have national ramifications when it comes to the incessantly touted panacea of “caste census” by Rahul Gandhi.
Politics Beyond Rhetoric. Politics of Credibility: When Priyanka Gandhi gave a clarion call—all along her campaign trail during the UP elections—for women’s empowerment, saying, “Ladki hoon, lad sakti hoon,” it sounded plausible. But as it turns out, it was another hollow promise given and forgotten by the Congress leadership. Having formed governments in the states of Karnataka, Telangana and Himachal, the Congress could not find suitable women leaders to lead by example. Even in Haryana, sidelining Kumari Shelja and giving Bhupinder Hooda a free run paints the Congress as patriarchal, anti-woman, and anti-Dalit. And no slide comments are being made on the dynastic politics here! Up north, the Congress nominating its strongman and veteran Chaudhary Lal Singh for the Bishora Assembly in Jammu’s Kathua was another ignominious decision. This for a man who joined a march supporting the accused in the Kathua gang rape case. The lies fall like a pack of cards!
RSS-BJP Ties: As veteran commentator Ratan Sarda once noted in his article, “RSS is not the field force for the BJP.” But if the two combine forces, they become a force to reckon with. Contrary to the rumour-mongering about strained relationships between the two, the fact is that the BJP was assured about its strength and force, and hence, an extra-added hand of the swayamsevaks was not sought. However, after being caught on the back foot in the recent general election, the BJP sought the support of its ideological progenitor, the RSS. With its committed cadre, the RSS took charge of one-on-one connections to ensure the BJP received all the logistical support needed to encourage voters to come out and vote, ruling out the voter complacency witnessed in the last polls.
From convening assembly-level meetings to door-to-door outreach, distributing voter slips, and providing necessary feedback to the BJP, the RSS was all over the place. It is being said that every household across Haryana’s 6,000 villages was reached at least twice by Sangh workers. This extensive grassroots effort was a crucial factor in the BJP’s unprecedented, historic, and miraculous victory.
Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Vadra were noticeably absent from the campaign trail. It seems Narendra Modi is here to stay, a fact the opposition is slowly coming to terms with. They’re beginning to understand: Modi’s style of politics can only be defeated by a leader possessing vision, intrepidness, organisational skills, integrity, and grit. Get ready, because the Maharashtra elections might just be in for another surprise!
Yuvraj Pokharna is an independent journalist and columnist. He tweets with @iyuvrajpokharna. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.
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