(Dr Pentapati Pullarao)
Narendra Modi is a very lucky man. When you lose in India, you lose fully. There is no middle path. Indira Gandhi lost badly in 1977. Rajiv Gandhi won 410 MPs and lost badly in 1989. P. V. Narasimha Rao was a very successful prime minister. But PV lost completely in 1996 and never came back. The same rule applies to Atal Behari Vajpayee, who lost in 2004 and his story was over. Jawaharlal Nehru was lucky since he won his third term in 1962 and then led India to a disastrous China war in 1962 November. Nehru died in May 1964. Had Nehru lived, there was a big defeat waiting for him. Lucky Nehru that history spared him. In 2024, Narendra Modi lost MPs in his strong states of Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Maharashtra. In 2019, in these 3 states, Modi won 130 MPs out of 153 MPs. In 2024, Modi won only 64 MPs. Modi lost 66 MPs in these 3 states. Modi would have been defeated, but for the miraculous victories in Telangana, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh.
1. A victory is a victory. Modi won the 2024 elections. The first cause of Modi holding on is that his personal image amongst 70% of people is very high. This has helped the BJP win as many MPs as it did.
2. The BJP realized that it needed allies, and it got new allies on a war-footing. The BJP got Deve Gowda (Karnataka), RLD (Uttar Pradesh), the SBSP (Uttar Pradesh), HAM (Bihar), Chirag Paswan (Bihar), Pawan Kalyan- TDP (Andhra Pradesh). The BJP retained the old allies and got new allies.
3. Wherever the BJP had allies, it could win MPs or at least stop defeat. It lost allies in Haryana, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Punjab and lost badly. Whatever the reasons, the BJP was arrogant and lazy and lost these states.
4. Narendra Modi had understood that he must implement anti- poverty programs and succeeded due to it. This helped Modi face the onslaught of the opposition that he favored the rich. That allegation did not work against Modi.
5. There is also no doubt that educated sections voted for Modi due to his successful foreign and defense policies. Modi was favored because he did increase India’s international image and withstood Chinese military pressure and showed a strong face to Pakistan. 6. The infra-structure push of Narendra Modi brought praise and votes form people. Batter roads, airports and Metro trains in cities did have a great effect. Many people in Telangana voted for BJP because of great infrastructure development.
7. There was also emphasis on increasing health and medical facilities across the country.
8. The downfall of Uddhav Thackeray government in June 2022 helped BJP avoid total defeat in Maharashtra. BJP won 18 MPs out of 48. Otherwise, it is doubtful if BJP would have crossed 10 MP s in Maharashtra.
9. The return of Nitish Kumar to BJP alliance in Bihar in December 2023 was a windfall for BJP and it won 30 out of 40 MPs. If Nitish Kumar remained with INDIA alliance, BJP would have won much fewer MPs.
10. The efforts of Modi and BJP to win over Northeast, Bengali, Odisha and the entire south by frequent visits and attention had helped the BJP to speared and stabilize in these states. In 2014, BJP won only 2 MPs out of 42 in Bengal and only 1 MP out of 21 in Odisha. In 2014, the BJP won only 1 out of 17 MPs in Telangana, totaling only 4 MPs out of 80 MPs. But by 2024, BJP won 40 MPs. This saved BJP.
There are many lessons that BJP can draw from this small victory. But definitely, the BJP’s continuous attention and hard work on Northeast, Bengal, Odisha, Telangana and the South has given it a victory in 2024. Whatever Modi does over the next 5 years is difficult to predict. But one satisfaction that Modi can have been that he has spread BJP across India. This is the cause of the victory of BJP in 2024. Right now, the BJP had won only 1 MP out of 60 MPs in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. It can focus on these states through popularizing itself and fi9ndign allies. The problem for the BJP is that it must change directions and strategies. The poor results in Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Haryana and Rajasthan are due to anti-incumbency, bad candidates, not giving enough importance to allies to Maharashtra and Rajasthan. When the results are not good as expected, then naturally every person will criticize. The RSS has been totally quiet from 2014 to 2024. But now, we find some RSS leaders showing their anger at BJP, which is obviously for personal reasons. When the BJP is in government, the RSS loses its power over it. The BJP also has to re-think because it fought regional parties like Kejriwal and Mamata Banerjee and made them unite with Congress. A better policy would have been to let them survive. The biggest problem for Modi is that the opposition is more united. One major cause of BJP’s setbacks is the over-exposure of Narendra Modi. Too much of anything is bad. But the main fact is that Modi won the 2024 elections, and he is the first prime minister since Nehru in 1962 to get a third term. That is the biggest achievement of Modi that he has managed to win.
(Author is Political and Economic analyst based in New Delhi)
