Reclaiming Political Glory
Satwant Singh Rissam (BSL, LLB, LLM, PGDHRM)
This year festival of Holi turned very special for many political workers. The colours were all in the air before the festival itself. The elections were held in 5 states of India i.e. Uttar Pradesh, Uttrakhand, Punjab, Manipur and Goa and results of these states were declared on 11th March 2017. The Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) workers were delighted with results and started reliving the charm of 2014 general elections in country. For BJP it was all because of the colourful speeches by their party leader and our Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Basically, Narendra Modi has come long way as it all started in 2014 and now in 2017 it appears that he has decimated not only opposition but also many leaders within his party. This is all because he is single handedly fighting all of his political opponents after 2014. Now with the victory of Uttar Pradesh (UP), the biggest state of India, Prime Minister's political stature has grown bigger.
In UP parties like Samajwadi Party, Congress and BSP are no where even close to the tally of BJP after the results. The alliance of Samajwadi and Congress couldn't do anything to harm the BJP. Though the campaign in UP started with development agenda but when different election phases passed we got to hear about qabristan and shamshans. Somewhere softly in UP the communal agenda was pursued by BJP as this time it was do or die for them. BJP wanted to secure this state which had given 71 MPs to party in 2014. This even forced Prime Minister of India to visit many narrow lanes of UP for his party. Now after winning 312 seats on its own out of 403 BJP feels that it has raised its chance to rule the country in 2019. This assumption of BJP was strengthen by the former Chief Minister of J&K Omar Abdullah when he on twitter suggested that whole opposition parties should strategize in new way to take on the Narendra Modi in 2024.Uttrakhand is another example which has proved that Narendra Modi's appeal as a leader has worked for BJP and it won 57 out of 70 seats there. The state ruled by Congress party saw its Chief Minister loosing from two seats. Even many cabinet ministers of Congress lost badly. This state didn't see much of communal agenda as part of campaign but being earlier part of united UP the message from there kept reaching Uttrakhand.
The colours of holi turned very bright for the Congress party also. It was an important turn out as Punjab, Manipur and Goa were all the 3 states where it got more seats than BJP. For Congress it is a moment wherein, it appeared reclaiming political glory after some years. Basically, these assembly results gave Congress a bigger reason to cheer than BJP. Punjab and Goa were the BJP ruled states and there Congress managed to win more seats than BJP. Irrespective of political ideologies we need to acknowledge this rise of Congress party. But for me it appeared a fact which media somewhere forgot to highlight under the colours of holi. In Punjab, the Congress is fully back on its knees with the efforts of Captain Amarinder Singh. Punjab is a pure example where we can see that Narendra Modi, who is now even being tagged as pan-India leader, wasn't able to dent the Congress party. In addition to it, Congress leader and Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh in Manipur helped the party to emerge as the single largest party by getting 28 out of total 60 seats. Furthermore, assembly results from the state of Goa added to the happiness of Congress party. There also Congress emerged as single largest party with 17 seats out of total 40 seats. This loss of BJP was highlighted by defeat of its Chief Minister along with some of his cabinet ministers. But as we all know that winning and losing in politics is game of numbers and same happened with Congress party in Manipur and Goa. Though the Congress was single largest party in these states yet BJP turned out more strong and managed to draw small parties into an alliance with them. While the Congress was searching for partners, BJP even after losing didn't lose and formed government in these 2 states.
By now all victory celebrations are over and new governments are formed in the states. But since then a negative wave is prevailing all over country after this election process. The first instance of it is the way in which BJP even after losing was able to form government in 2 states. Second case is of rising allegations about tampering done with Electronic Voting Machines. I know finding answers to these questions will have the reflection of political ideology of every person. So in general, should we just perceive this all as part of the democratic set up or as a shadow over democratic set up? Inspite of this all, Indian democracy is moving to future, under a new face of politics with a belief that political structures in country won't be altered because of growing power in politics.
