Two phases of polling for the seven phase assembly elections to the five states have concluded and the third phase is due on February 20. By then, in three states – Goa, Uttarakhand and Punjab – the polling will be completed. Only remaining phases in Uttar Pradesh and polls for Manipur will be left.
The top leaders of the BJP and the Congress have covered poll bound states and with the Covid curbs easing, offline rallies are witnessing the presence of both the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Congress MP Rahul Gandhi in their respective party rallies.
Narendra Modi is the principal speaker in the BJP’s rallies, both online till a few days back and now offline. He is the natural leader of the BJP and the party is counting on him to perform well. But an in depth analysis of Modi’s speeches indicates that he is not just talking of the assembly elections but making points for preparing the voters in these five states for the Lok Sabha elections due two years from now in April/May 2024.
Narendra Modi’s main attack is against the Congress, mainly Rahul Gandhi. He is deliberately trying to make the next Lok Sabha elections as a sort of referendum against Rahul Gandhi. This positioning suits him from his own calculations which have been worked out by the party’s think tank.
Whatever may be the general perception about the strength of the Congress, the ground reality is that the Congress is the most broad-based national party which is challenging the BJP in the electoral field.
In the current round of elections, the Congress is the main challenger to the BJP in the four states of Goa, Uttarakhand, Punjab and Manipur. Only in Uttar Pradesh, Samajwadi Party is the main challenger to the BJP.Later this year, in the assembly elections in two states, Himachal and Gujarat, the contest will be between the Congress and the BJP.
Then in 2023, Congress will be the main national party challenging the BJP in most of the states which will go to the polls.In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the Congress got 52 seats as against 303 seats of BJP, but in 209 seats, the Congress got the second position. In in many of these seats, the Congress can post wins if there is some understanding between the Congress and non-BJP parties.
Modi’s strategy is to debunk Rahul Gandhi as a leader and pursue the policy of divide and rule by creating a division between the Congress and the regional parties. His strategy is aimed at ensuring a second front of anti-BJP parties and to ensure a rift between the regional parties and the Congress.
The proposed meeting in Mumbai between the Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao with the Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray on Sunday assumes special importance in this context. KCR of late has taken a position against the BJP and is talking of removing Narendra Modi from power in the next Lok Sabha elections. He is feeling threatened by BJP's communal card in Telangana. He feels that the communal environment can be transported to his state by the BJP from Karnataka on the hijab issue.
KCR’s worries are genuine and his meeting with the Shiv Sena supremo Uddhav may form the base of an understanding which can be shared by both the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin.
Already there is a talk of the CM's conference in Delhi on the issue of the Centre-state relations and this conference can be extended to include Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik and also the Congress CMs.Here comes the ego issues of Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee. She has said that the Congress CMs will not be the part of the proposed CMs’ conference. This only helps Modi’s proposed strategy keep the non-BJP opposition divided.
For the Congress and also the regional parties, especially Mamata, there should be clarity that no front of combined opposition parties is possible without the participation of the Congress.
Earlier, NCP leader Sharad Pawar acted as a bridge between the regional parties and the Congress. Pawar is not keeping well now. So, the best course is that Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin and the Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray take the initiative in holding the conference of the parties who are ready to fight BJP jointly in the Lok Sabha poll.
Both these leaders have got good equation with Rahul and Mamata. Both believe in a total front of opposition including the Congress. Their combined action can mitigate any ego clashes that might arise, thereby foiling Modi’s strategy to retain power at the Centre again by dividing the opposition.
