Politics in the heartland has returned to normal
The bypoll results show that just riding on Modi or Yogi’s popularity may not work for the BJP in Uttar Pradesh
If you needed a sign of both the fragility of politics and robustness of democracy, the by-election results from Uttar Pradesh have just offered it. Four years ago, the BJP (with an ally) won 73 of the 80 Lok Sabha seats in UP. It made the difference between Narendra Modi leading a messy coalition government and BJP running a majority government. One year ago, the BJP swept the assembly polls. It catapulted Yogi Adityanath to the position of CM, and left the Opposition defeated and demoralised. On March 14, it all changed.
It requires skills for an incumbent to lose a by-election, for voters don’t see an incentive to vote for the Opposition when the government won’t change. It requires even greater skill to lose if the by-elections are in seats held by the CM and deputy CM, as was the case in Gorakhpur and Phulpur. And it requires extraordinary talent to lose when you are in charge of both the Centre and state. Yet, the BJP achieved precisely this feat.
There are many explanations for the defeat. One, the BSP’s support for the SP candidate changed the political arithmetic; the anti-BJP votes did not get fragmented. Two, it created a formidable social alliance. In Gorakhpur, Yadavs, Muslims, Nishads and Dalits came together; in Phulpur, a substantial section of OBC (both Yadav and non-Yadav), Dalit and Muslim votes consolidated. Three, the BJP’s candidate selection did not work. In Phulpur, the candidate was an outsider; in Gorakhpur, he was not from the Gorakhnath temple.
But while these are important variables, there is bigger message from the election: the ‘hawa’, wave, is over.
The BJP’s success in the 2014 and 2017 polls was based on overcoming local constraints. These were, only half in jest, termed ‘lamppost’ elections, where even if a lamp-post contested on the lotus symbol, it would win. These were polls where the traditional caste calculus collapsed and the BJP weaved together inclusive Hindu social coalitions — of upper castes, OBCs and Dalits. These were polls in which one man mattered — Narendra Modi. And the Modi hawa swept everything aside.
With the bypoll results, politics has returned to normal in the Hindi heartland. It shows that micro-caste calculations will now matter. It shows that sustaining wide caste coalitions may not be easy and contradictions between upper castes and OBCs as well as upper castes and Dalits are returning. It shows candidate selection will matter. It shows that the normal rules of anti-incumbency against the state and the Centre will play out. It shows that just riding on Modi — or Yogi, who was billed as the man capable of delivering UP on his own — may not work.
All of this means that politics has now opened up. The 2019 election is truly open.