Incumbency hurts BJP, but organisational strength helps it
Congress’s Dalit-tribal-OBC card just clicking
Ravindra Ojha @ EW News
Election Commission has yet to announce poll schedule, but electioneering picked up pace in Madhya Pradesh. Be it ruling BJP or opposition Congress, stalwarts of both these parties have thrown their weight behind the campaigning. Nobody wants to be a looser in perception and narrative building excercise. PM Narendra Modi started the election campaigning with whirlwind tour of the poll bound state. He can be heard exuding confidence of landslide victory of BJP in upcoming hustings. So is the Congress stalwart Rahul Gandhi, who is leaving no stone unturned in claiming party resounding win in assembly polls due later this year. But the question is whether BJP or Congress commands a more cohesive, effective social coalition.
So far all the opinion polls points to an extremely tight race with incumbent Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan facing strong anti- incumbency wrath. Perhaps challenger Congress has some slight edge over the BJP in upcoming polls as it’s Dalit, tribal and OBC card seems to be clicking across MP.
The dramatic shift of OBC towards Congress has become a major cause of concern for the BJP’s poll strategists. According to political scientist Shiv Kumar Vivek, OBC happens to be the traditional vote bank of BJP in post 2000 Madhya Pradesh politics. This community’s affinity with Congress takes a break in 2003 owing to the perceived tilt of grand old party towards Dalits and tribals. With the emergence of leaders such as Uma Bharti and later Chauhan, OBC stormed towards a BJP platform. Others backwards as an aggregate represent nearly a 40% demographic share. In 2003 polls, numerically powerful OBCs, BJP 50% of the votes as against just 26% for Congress. But presently OBC’s story seems to have changed for BJP. Now this agrarian class do not appear a stable bloc in favour of saffron brigade. CM Shivraj Singh Chauhan hold over the OBC communities has been considerably weakened by increased factional sniping. Now OBCs are being aggressively wooed by Kamal Nath led Congress campaign that is promising increased reservation for the community. BJP had already faced a pronounced Dalits and tribals backlash the last elections. According to surveys of the 2018 elections, Congress led BJP by 10 percentage points among tribals and among Dalits by a remarkable 16.
However, the BJP-RSS organisation remains strong in the state and the saffron party still appears to be a formidable force in urban constituencies and it’s traditional stronghold of Malwa region. So let us wait and watch a keenly contested electoral battle ahead in Madhya Pradesh.
