Opp missed chances, BJP to gain in east, south, may win over 300 seats: Prashant Kishor

NEW DELHI, April 7: Validating the BJP’s claims, eminent political strategist Prashant Kishor said the ruling party will add significantly to its seats and vote share in south and east India, the two regions where its hold is weak-to-non-existent, barring Karnataka.
In an interaction, Kishor also said despite the BJP’s apparent dominance, neither the party nor Prime Minister Narendra Modi is invincible, pointing out that the opposition had three distinct and realistic chances of stopping the BJP juggernaut but frittered away the opportunities because of laziness and misplaced strategies.
“They (BJP) will either be first or second party in Telangana which is a big thing. They will be number one in Odisha for sure. You would be surprised as, in all likelihood, to my mind, the BJP is going to be the number one party in West Bengal,” he said. In Tamil he said, BJP’s vote share may hit double-digit percentage.
Telangana, Odisha, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Kerala together account for 204 seats in the 543-member Lok Sabha but the BJP couldn’t cross 50 seats in all these states put together either in 2014 or 2019 when it won 29 and 47 constituencies respectively.
He, however, asserted that the BJP is unlikely to win 370 seats, its target set for the polls.
In Andhra Pradesh, where assembly polls will be held alongside the Lok Sabha elections, he said Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy will find it “very difficult” to come back. Kishor had worked for Reddy in 2019 when his YSRC party had vanquished the incumbent Telugu Desam Party, now a BJP ally. Speaking of the Lok Sabha polls starting from April 19, he said the BJP will feel the heat only if the opposition, especially the Congress, can ensure that it loses at least around 100 seats in its strongholds of north and west India. And that’s not going to happen, he says.
“By and large, the BJP will be able to hold its ground in these regions,” he said.
The BJP has made a major and visible push to expand in south and east India over the years as its top leaders like Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah have frequented these states. On the other hand, the opposition has made little effort in these states.
“Count the number of visits the prime minister had made to Tamil Nadu in the last five years versus Rahul Gandhi or Sonia Gandhi or any other opposition leader for that matter made in battleground states. Your fight is in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh but you are touring Manipur and Meghalaya. Then how you will get success,” he said in an apparent swipe at Rahul Gandhi. Asked about his take on Rahul Gandhi’s reported reluctance to contest from his family’s pocket borough Amethi after losing the seat to Smriti Irani in 2019, he said the opposition party cannot win the country by winning Kerala alone.
“If you do not win in UP, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, there is no benefit if you win from Wayanad. Strategically, I can say that letting that space (Amethi) go will only send a wrong message,” Kishor said He noted that Modi had chosen to contest from Uttar Pradesh in addition to his home state Gujarat in 2014 “because you cannot win India unless you win the Hindi heartland or have a significant presence in the Hindi heartland.” With opposition parties coming together to form the INDIA bloc to take on the BJP, he said an alliance is neither desirable nor effective to defeat the ruling party as there is already a one-on-one contest in nearly 350 seats.
The BJP has been winning because parties like the Congress, Samajwadi Party, RJD, NCP and Trinamool Congress are unable to take it head-on in their own turfs, he said.
They have no narrative, face or agenda, he said. (PTI)