AN UPHILL CLIMB
The new incumbent has the unenviable task of managing the Covid upsurge and balancing the state’s finances
On May 2, within hours of a clear trend emerging in favour of the BJP-led alliance in Assam, intense speculation began as to who the next chief minister would be. In fact, choosing the right candidate to helm the state became more challenging for the BJP leadership than winning the state for the second consecutive time. The significance of the decision can be gauged from the fact that the party’s central leadership remained mum on the issue for more than 72 hours. They had to choose between two strong contenders—incumbent chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal and finance, education, health and PWD minister in his cabinet, Himanta Biswa Sarma, who single-handedly managed the party’s electoral campaign, from ticket distribution to logistics to setting the poll narrative.
It was not an easy call for the BJP. Sarma’s electoral strategy was the X factor in the party’s victory. Besides, the BJP was aware of the damage a disgruntled Sarma could wreak on the party. In fact, he joined the BJP in 2015 because Rahul Gandhi was reluctant to replace Tarun Gogoi with him as the chief minister. From that date, he became the architect of the Congress wipeout in the northeast. At the same time, the BJP does not have the legacy of removing an incumbent chief minister when the party has returned to power with the same number of seats as last time.
Now that the decision has been taken, the challenge for the saffron party is to make the other fall in line. The BJP, which lost out to the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC in West Bengal despite a high-profile campaign by Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself and Union home minister Amit Shah cannot afford any instability in Assam, the gateway to the northeast. In fact, any sign of a factional fight within the Assam unit would have a cascading effect on the other five northeastern states where the BJP is in power either on its own or in alliance.
More importantly, the new chief minister has to tackle Covid’s brutal resurgence in Assam. On May 3, daily Covid cases in the state jumped to 4,000—the highest this year— with a positivity rate of over 10 per cent. Political instability
at this time will be hugely detrimental to the new government. That’s the reason why the BJP’s central leadership has to ensure that the current arrangement of power-sharing between Sarma and Sonowal remains sustainable in the long run.
Adding to the crown of thorns for the new chief minister will be the financial crunch. The outgoing government leaves behind committed liabilities of Rs 23,000 crore besides a cumulative debt of Rs 85,000 crore. While the Covid fightback will put additional pressure on the state exchequer, the new government will also have to find ways to fund campaign promises of doles and 100,000 government jobs by next year. “The current financial situation demands exceptional skills in budgeting available funds. The government will also have to explore new avenues of resource generation,” says Shyamkanu Mahanta, a Guwahati-based financial consultant and entrepreneur.
Law and order will be another challenge. Though there has been peace in the state in the past five years barring a week-long agitation against the CAA or Citizenship (Amendment), 2019, there have been a couple of abductions by the Paresh Baruah faction of the United Liberation Front of Assam in the past six months. An ONGC employee, who was abducted with two others, remains untraced till now. The other two have been rescued. While top police officials dub these abductions as a desperate attempt by Baruah to make his presence felt, the negative perception will do no favours to the state, which has been desperately seeking industrial investment. “It may not be a serious security threat, but will dent the state’s industrial and tourist potential,” says a BJP leader, who did not want to be named.
THE BJP STRATEGY
In a state where Muslims comprise 40 per cent of the population, the BJP had a demographic disadvantage, particularly after the Congress formed an eight-party alliance, which included the Badruddin Ajmal-led AIUDF (All India United Democratic Front), which represented the interests of immigrant Muslims in the state. Making matters worse was the anger of the Assamese-speaking people against CAA.
In the face of these challenges, the BJP’s central leadership entrusted Sarma with the task of crafting the electoral strategy of the party. That’s the reason it refrained from announcing a chief ministerial candidate despite Sonowal already helming the state. Sarma ran a massive campaign aimed at neutralising the anger against CAA, consolidating the Hindu vote and wooing women voters with doles.
He projected AIUDF chief Ajmal as a civilisational threat to Assamese linguistic and cultural identity. If the Congress sought to benefit from the consolidation of the Muslim vote, Sarma’s campaign intended to bring everyone in Assam who feared the takeover by illegal Bangladeshi immigrants under one umbrella. “He successfully converted the binary of the battle from Assamese vs illegal immigrants to Hindu vs Muslim,” says Ankuran Dutta, head of the mass communication department at Gauhati University.
In an interview to india today, Sarma acknowledged his role in the creation of the two parties that grew out of the anti-CAA agitation—the Asom Jatiya Parishad (AJP) and Raijor Dal. Sarma, with his inter-party network, managed to indirectly influence their ticket distribution. The two parties helped divide the anti-CAA vote, allowing the BJP to retain its hold among Assamese-speaking voters, winning 32 of 36 such constituencies (see How the BJP Retained Assam). “The AJP and Raijor Dal seem to have helped the BJP consolidate its position in upper Assam. They need to do some soul-searching on how they ended up helping the
very forces they were opposing,” says Jitendra Singh, the All India Congress Committee in-charge of Assam.
What played an even bigger role in neutralising antiCAA sentiment was Sarma’s performance as health minister during the pandemic. Leading from the front, Sarma criss-crossed Assam, micro-managing the preparedness and fightback, which not only kept the virus in check during the first wave but also earned him massive goodwill among the people. This was evident in his rallies and roadshows, where he was greeted like a rock star, with people jostling to have a glimpse of him or touch him.
The biggest game-changer, however, was the beneficiary schemes Sarma designed as finance minister, particularly for women voters. The BJP has promised that the financial aid provided under its Arunodoi scheme—given to women members of the household—will be increased from Rs 830 to Rs 3,000 a month. Then, in rally after rally, Sarma promised to waive loans worth Rs 12,000 crore that women selfhelp groups had taken from micro-financing agencies. Even Congress leaders, who also included a monthly stipend of Rs 2,000 to women voters among its five guarantees, accept the impact of these announcements. “People already availing these benefits did not want to lose them. They trusted Sarma to deliver,” says Debabrata Saikia, a senior Congress leader in Assam.
The new chief minister must now ensure that the hardearned victory of the BJP doesn’t go waste and deliver on the expectations of the voters. There will be no honeymoon period for the man in the hot seat. He will have to hit the ground running. ■