The ‘semi-finals’ for the Lok Sabha polls 2019 is, as per initial reckoning, an uphill task for the ruling BJP and its captain Prime Minister Narendra Modi. For one, not a single state among the five up for polls gives it a guarantee to success – even as three of them are currently under the party’s diktat. Its implications for the Lok Sabha polls next year are serious to be ignored by the saffron side.
The Congress party is making a serious bid for power in Madhya Pradesh, where a rare unity has been crafted this time between warring factions in the state party apparatus. Leading the Congress charge is former Union minister Kamal Nath, ably backed by old war horse Digvijaya Singh and the young Jyotiraditya Scindia. Their unity of purpose is bound to help the Congress this time. Chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan is feeling the heat of an all-too-spectacular anti-incumbency wave. In Rajasthan, the anti-incumbency wave is stronger. Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje is being checkmated by the Congress stalwarts Sachin Pilot and Ashok Gehlot through a well-oiled campaign machinery. Of them, who would become chief minister if the Congress floors the BJP this time is a big question, though. The recent assembly and parliamentary by-polls in the state had put the BJP on alert, having lost most of it one after another. If the BJP loses both Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh – the two major north Indian states – that could be interpreted as the beginning of the end of the saffron surge in the country after Modi stormed to power in Delhi in 2014.
Chief minister Raman Singh is facing a formidable challenge in Chhattisgarh from first chief minister Ajit Jogi who had turned his back on the Congress and is fighting the polls in association with the BSP of Mayawati. The Congress, it looks like, has little hope to affect a turnaround there. In Mizoram too the regional entity – Mizo National Front (MNF), is all set to give the ruling Congress a run for its money. Strange things are happening in Telangana, as popular chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and his TRS are caught in a bitter struggle for power. There, the Congress and the TDP are fighting the polls together, and the BJP is not much in the reckoning.
Notably, the BJP is now bereft of the gains it made from the Modi magic of the 2014 polls. It has to fight every inch of the way to retain its bases.