BJP on the move as Oppn hibernates
LUCKNOW: With less than two years to go for the 2019 general elections in the country, the opposition continues to be in complete disarray, literally refusing to even crawl at a time when BJP’s national president Amit Shah is on a 95-day hectic tour of many states.
As Shah himself rightly says, ‘My mission is to galvanise the cadre to improve the 2014 tally of 282 (the best ever won by any party since 1984) and not strengthen the Opposition.’
And while his visits are creating tremors across the country, the opposition continues to hibernate. The country’s map is getting saffronised with BJP increasing its footprints in states after states.
The ‘Congress Mukt Bharat’ project that it had aggressively launched in 2014 is by and large complete as its main competitor at the national level has shrunk to barely half a dozen states.
Now the BJP wants the Congress to stay but its culture to end.
This vis a vis the Opposition, which is suffering one debacle after another. Spate of incidents should have by now run the alarm bell such as Shanker Singh Vaghela quitting Congress, another 11 MLAs cross voting in favour of NDA nominee Ram Nath Kovind in Gujarat, the collapse of Grand Alliance in Bihar and defections from the SP and the BSP much before Shah visited UP recently.
And for every state they have a different strategy and approach, including breaking away caste groups.
Having by and large conquered North, the BJP is eyeing Odisha and West Bengal, thereafter the southern states.
It is steadfastly moving on its blueprint inked in Odisha in April 2017 to make BJP a pan-India party -- from Panchayat to Parliament.
And on its radar are now the regional forces that have dominated regional politics - SP, BSP, BJD, RJD and Trinamool Congress.
Perhaps the Congress has none but themselves to blame! While Shah is busy strengthening the already robust party, telling cadre not to get complacent as the opposition is weak, the Congress and other regional parties have yet to start working on an electoral strategy or alliance to checkmate Narendra Modi’s onward march.
There would have been some murmurs had the Congress started mobilizing the opposition for the 2019 polls as it cannot defeat the BJP alone.
The Congress doesn’t hold the same level of secrecy as that of the Sangh Parivar. The media has come to know now that the BJP high command had closed door meetings with about four dozen UP leaders before clearing the name of Yogi Adityanath as chief minister.
Either the opposition is pinning its hope on a miracle or has surrendered already. As such the common refrain today is, ‘Who can defeat Narendra Modi in 2019 in the absence of any strong opposition?’
Perhaps the Congress could at least improve its electoral prospects by projecting young leadership in states ruled by the BJP. They have enormous young talent in every state and they need to be given a task.
The revival of the moribund Congress in the country cannot be done from Delhi. The party will need home grown leaders to take on the regional satraps of the BJP.
THE ‘CONGRESS MUKT BHARAT’ PROJECT THAT IT (BJP) HAD LAUNCHED IN 2014 IS BY AND LARGE COMPLETE AS ITS MAIN COMPETITOR HAS SHRUNK TO BARELY HALF A DOZEN STATES.