Anil Anand
The Election Commission of India declared the seven-phase schedule for the crucial Lok Sabha elections that would decide the fate of Prime Minister Narendra Modi who is seeking a second successive term and the fledgling opposition particularly Congress busy sewing up alliances to check the might of BJP under Modi-Amit Shah combo as they for a virtual fight for survival. The die has been caste, the bugle sounded and the battleslines drawn for the over seven decade old democracy to elect a new Government.
Although there are no official estimates as yet on this aspect the entire 2019 Lok Sabha election process will cost an unprecendented Rs 500 billion or a little more. This is the estimation provided by New Delhi-based Centre for Media Studies.
Nine hundred million voters would be in the line of duty to vote during the seven phases across the country to discharge their most important democratic duty. The number of voters has gone up by 84.3 million since the last Lok Sabha elections, said Chief Election Commissioner, Sunil Arora.
Importantly, and which is going to be one of the key area for political parties to operative during the campaign is the rising youth power reflected in their increasing numbers as new voters. For records sake 15 million or 1.50 crore first time voters between the age of 18 to 19 will exercise their right to franchise. The first time voters account for 1.66 per cent of the total electorate
Attracting young voters that includes this newly added section of first time voters would be an important but a daunting task for the political parties. The debate, in fact, has already begun on employment avenues that were created during the last five years of BJP led NDA rule. While the ruling dispensation has been backing its claim of having made considerable headway in this area, Congress-led opposition has hit back hard questioning these claims.
Although, any political party would ignore any section of the electorates, at its own peril but the rival groups will be hard pressed to convince the youth about their plans in the field of education, employment and other related areas. After all it were the strong youth force of more than 150 million first time voters that had played an important role in bringing the BJP to power in 2014. The only difference being the opposition does not have to show anything in terms of work done.
The ruling BJP would be at an advantageous position with resources and capacity to take and implement quick decisions. Given the serious challenge posed by the BJP, it was being expected that Congress and regional satraps such as Bahujan Samaj Party, Samajwadi Party, Nationalist Congress Party, Trinmool Congress, the Left groupings, and in down south Telegu Desam Party, Telengana Rashtra Samithi, YSR Congress, Janata Dal (s) so on so forth, would act more realistically seeing the impending danger which the Modi juggernaut poses to them and act accordingly to present a formidable alternative in the form of a new front which was initially baptised as ‘Mahaghatbandhan’. The expectations have so far been belied and the opposition unity at the national levels is nowhere in sight as the country gears up for the first phase of elections polling for which would be held on April 11.
The big area of concern for BJP would be the timely shaking of hands by foes turned friends Bahujan Samaj Party and Samajwadi Party in Utter Pradesh. BSP supremo Mayawati and SP chief Akhilesh Yadav never had any problem once they decided to bury their past and work together for Lok Sabha elections. UP sends the highest number of 80 MPs to Lok Sabha and BJP had in 2014 accounted for 71 of the seats with its allies chipping in with few more seats.
The BSP-SP alliance has been a sliverlining in the otherwise shoddy story of ‘Mahaghatbandhan’ formation. It had its share of controversies initially when Congress was ignored and completely left out by the two parties. Although Congress does not have much strength in the state but it was expected that at least for the sake of war of perception and moral victory the BSP-SP-Congress alliance would give a head-start to the ever fragile opposition unity efforts. That did not happen. Nonetheless, BSP-SP alliance has the potential to stop the Modi-rath at least in UP leading in reduction of seats which the BJP won last time.
The Hindi heartland that includes Bihar could also be a worrying factor for the BJP. Notwithstanding the fact that Bihar, with 40 Lok Sabha seats, has a JD (u) – BJP coalition Government, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) led opposition including Congress could pose serious problems provided they close their ranks and are earnest in their endeavour to defeat BJP-JD (u) – Lok Jan Shakti Party combine at the hustings.
All eyes are now riveted on Congress as to how it plans the over century old party plans its next move under such trying circumstances and with and unrelenting Modi Government persistently building pressure on it by attacking from all sides. The party has just concluded its working committee meeting in Ahemdabad before it went into alliance formation exercise with a renewed vigour. By organising the CWC meeting in Gujarat the party wished to deliver a message that, apart from it being the home turf of PM Modi, it wished to move ahead with Mahatma Gandhi’s ideals to counter the “saffron agenda”.
A big gain for the party after being left out of the opposition alliance in UP is the advent of Priyanka Gandhi on the political scene. Although she was appointed All India Congress Committee general secretary in charge of crucial eastern UP that also includes Modi’s constituency Varanasi, it is felt that her services would be utilised in rest of the country as well. Squarely based on the premise that she resembles her much dynamic grandmother and former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi both in terms of looks and mannerism and that she politically savy, the Congress rank and file has been enthused by her entry into politics. But she herself would have to walk an extra mile to prove her worth both for Congress and the party chief Rahul Gandhi.
She along with another AICC general secretary in charge of western part of the UP, Jyotiraditya Scindia, have difficult task to galvanise the organisation in the state and at the same time to be prepared for elections. They are running against time as election schedule has already been announced. Priyanka will have to formulate and declare her plan for UP without any delay.
Southern India had always been a stronghold and saviour for the Congress but not anymore now. Barring Karnataka where Congress is in power in alliance with JD (s), and Kerala, it is in a bad state in Andhra Pradesh, Telengana and Tamil Nadu. Despite an early alliance with TDP’s N Chandra Babu Naidu, it would still have to cover a lot of ground to expect a reasonable performance in Andhra Pradesh as well in neighbouring newly carved state of Telengana. Telengana has in fact Congress’ Achilles heel in the region.
The BJP’s aggressive approach to find new territories such as Kerala in the south and West Bengal, where Congress has been decimated by Trinmool Congress and is now working out an understanding with the Left parties, in the East has resulted in political unrest in these areas. So, to keep its base in tact in Kerala in the face of an aggressive BJP prepared to go to any length would be quite a task for the Congress.
Despite having been out of reckoning in Tamlil Naidu for the past many decades, Congress secured an advantage in the Dravidian state as it found a strong ally in DMK in the very beginning. The DMK’s newly anointed chief Stalin was perhaps the first opposition leader to declare Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate of the opposition parties. He did not retract despite objections raised by many opposition parties.
Much would depend on how the party and its strategists draw their electoral plans and at the same time deal with the potential alliance partners. After all, the Congress is new to alliance politics despite having run a coalition Government for 10 years.
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