New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will have to assess whether its corruption-free image has faced a setback due to the inflow of “tainted leaders” into the party, Prafulla Ketkar has said in an editorial in the Organiser.
He said that while the Lok Sabha election results are historic given that the Narendra Modi-led BJP has been voted back to power for a third consecutive term, there is also a hidden message that the ruling party needs to introspect.
“BJP will also have to assess whether the party’s image, especially on the corruption-free politics agenda, has faced a dent with the admission of some of the tainted leaders in the party or alliance,” he writes. “Consolidating anti-BJP votes in the critical states beyond the conventional lines, re-emerging caste-based identities and possible intervention from foreign players are the mysterious trends that the party strategists will have to address.”
“There is a need for greater ground-level confidence-building measures among various castes and communities so that the vicious agenda of widening the fault lines does not succeed. BJP will have to educate and energise the party workers to counter this trend and make them stakeholders while implementing various social inclusion schemes,” he added.
Ostensibly responding to the ongoing speculation that the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) did not campaign for the BJP this time, Ketkar said that barring 1977, when restoration of democracy was needed, the Sangh had never come out openly in support of any political party.
“The only concern is that politics should remain with the ‘nation first’ approach. RSS perceives elections as an opportunity to educate voters and refine public opinion on various national issues and the organisation has done that in every state through its Swayamsevaks,” Ketkar said.
‘Christians & Hindu Meitei didn’t vote BJP’
In Panchjanya weekly magazine, Dibya Kamal Bordoloi writes how despite the polarisation of votes, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) did well in Assam, Tripura and Sikkim. However, the same magic could not work in Manipur, Meghalaya, and Nagaland.
“Polarisation of votes on the basis of religion in the Northeast is presenting new challenges. Due to Muslim-Christian polarisation, the road is not easy especially for BJP and NDA in Assam. Despite this, NDA under the leadership of Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has improved its previous performance and won 11 seats. The seats on which Congress has won in Assam are Muslim-dominated. This time BJP has got 9 out of 14 seats, while NDA’s constituents Asom Gana Parishad and United People’s Party Liberal have got one seat each. That is, NDA has got 11 out of 14 seats,” he wrote.
Similarly, he considers the strong performance of Christians and churches as the reason for the poor performance of the NDA in Christian-dominated states like Nagaland, Mizoram, and Meghalaya.
“Christians and churches campaigned and contested elections against BJP and NDA in Christian-dominated states like Nagaland, Mizoram, Mifeghalaya and Kuki along with Naga-dominated hill districts of Manipur.
“The majority Hindu Meitei community had earlier supported BJP in the assembly and Lok Sabha elections, but this time it went in favour of Congress. Due to this, the Inner Manipur seat occupied by BJP and the Outer Manipur seat occupied by NDA’s constituent Naga People’s Front went to Congress,” Bordoloi wrote.
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Significance of Thrissur win
In the Organiser weekly magazine, Vishnu Arvind writes about the BJP’s upsurge in the Left bastion of Kerala as seen in the win of Suresh Gopi from Thrissur and the continuous rising vote percentage of the party.
“In Kerala, NDA’s vote share increased dramatically. BJP not only triumphed in Thrissur but also placed second in Thiruvananthapuram. Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar, who fought against Shashi Tharoor, lost by only 16,077 votes,” he wrote.
“NDA boosted their vote share in Kerala from 15.56 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections to 19.24 per cent in 2024. At the same time, Congress front’s vote share, which was 47.34 per cent and 19 seats in 2019, has dropped to 45.10 per cent and 18 seats this time.”
Pointing out the BJP’s maximum vote share in 11 assembly seats, Arvind wrote: “Notable fact is that BJP came first in 11 assembly constituencies held by Communist parties and second in eight assembly constituencies held by both fronts.”
Jagan’s ‘communal’ politics
In Organiser, senior research associate at CSIS Pradakshina tells about why the Jaganmohan Reddy government was ousted by the people and Chandrababu Naidu-led Telugu Desam Party (TDP) assumed the throne.
It was the anti-Hindu stance that made YSRCP out of power, she wrote. “Demolition of important temples, a series of desecration of temples, burning of temple chariots by unknown person several places, including in antarvedi, vandalisation of Murthis in other places, the brutal cutting down of the head of Bhagwan Srirama on a hillock in the ancient Ramatheertham temple in Vizianagaram district left people desolated and inconsolable.”
“The sudden removal of Ashok Gajapathi Raju, a descendant of Vizianagaram samsthanam, from the hereditary trusteeship of the famous Sri Varaha Narasimha Swamy temple in Simhachalam by violating all customary norms enraged the people,” she contended.
The other reasons, she asserted were the appointment of Karunakar Reddy, allegedly a Christian, and later Dharma Reddy belonging to the YS Jaganmohan Reddy family, as the chairpersons of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) board, the failure to remove Christian employees from TTD among others.
The arrest of Chandrababu Naidu and several TDP ex-ministers in the earlier years by the YSRCP govt severely dented its political prospects, Pradakshina wrote. “Moreover, the YSRCP Government’s CID dept arrested their own sitting rebel MP Raghuramakrishna Raju and got him beaten black and blue for daring to speak the truth in Lok Sabha, regarding the rampant Christian conversions, which have reportedly crossed 25 per cent, thus changing the State’s demographics.”
Victory in Odisha
Writing in Panchjanya, Samanvay Nand writes that PM Modi’s storm swept Odisha and the issue of Odia culture and giving vouchers of Rs 50,000 to women worked perfectly in this election.
“The Bharatiya Janata Party had made Odia culture an issue in this election. Along with this, issues related to the loss of the key of the Ratna Bhandar of Mahaprabhu Shri Jagannath Ji Temple and not opening the four doors of the temple were also raised. In its manifesto, the BJP had talked about providing vouchers of Rs 50,000 to women by making a scheme named Subhadra. Along with this, the BJP had promised to buy paddy at Rs 3,100 per quintal and transfer the money to the bank accounts of farmers within 48 hours,” he said.
‘Foreign help’ to Congress propaganda
In this week’s editorial of Panchjanya, Hitesh Shankar has raised questions about the propaganda being spread allegedly by Congress by means of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and foreign powers.
“In politics, there are allegations and counter-allegations. Many times the level of language also falls, but joining hands with foreign powers in mutual fight has also been seen in this Lok Sabha election. Earlier there would have been only allegations. However, this time a foreign company named Congress and announced that another foreign company has created a whole web of ‘propaganda’,” he claimed.
“Just before the seventh and final phase of voting in the 18th Lok Sabha elections, another foreign tech giant company Open AI has made a big disclosure related to Congress. It is claimed that STOIC, an Israeli company specialising in political campaigning, ran an anti-India agenda under the campaign ‘Operation Zero Geno’ to influence voters during the Lok Sabha elections and change the election results. For this, negative news was spread against the government, while praising the Congress.”
Operation Zero Geno, he alleged, was a big technical conspiracy that was hatched to influence public opinion in the Lok Sabha elections.
“From the beginning till the last phase of voting, a specific kind of narrative was being churned on social media in which the government, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP were being targeted. On the other hand, content was being created in favour of the Congress and the Samajwadi Party,” Shankar claimed.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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