Gujarat, Himachal wins: All credit goes to PM Modi, BJP chief Shah

Vibha Sharma

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, December 18

The BJP on Monday won Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh, comfortably, despite the tough tightrope in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state where it had to depend upon his impassioned appeals to the “asmita” of  voters to form the government for the sixth consecutive time there.

The credit for the victory, particularly in Gujarat, goes entirely to the Prime Minister and his confidant Amit Shah. The duo managed to pull the party from an embarrassingly poor performance (if not defeat) as was being predicted in the state in the face of two decades of anti-incumbency.

However, led by Prime Minister Modi, the saffron party not just secured its sixth consecutive win in Gujarat but also snatched Himachal Pradesh from the Congress, up to 19 the number of states governed by it or with allies. Including Himachal now, the BJP will now have 14 Chief Ministers of its own and that’s huge achievement. 

But the results also show the game is very much on for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. It was evident in the somewhat subdued body language of party chief Amit Shah when he today addressed media and blamed “low level of campaigning” by rivals for his party’s not-such-a-good show in Gujarat.

The Prime Minister’s entire Cabinet and party’s popular Chief Ministers campaigned in the Gujarat. Shah had predicted 150 seats for the party in the 182-member State Assembly.

Party leaders have already said there will be introspection on each seat, right down to the booth-level, to ascertain what went wrong and how on the seats they lost (some by very low margins). 

While the BJP leaders may call the victory a thumbs-up to Prime Minister Modi’s economic and development policies, its performance in rural Gujarat is an indication that they can no longer ignore agrarian distress/crisis in such areas.

It is an important lesson ahead of four big elections — Karnataka, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh — and the mother of all—the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. 

Because the results prove the BJP is not as invincible as was being thought of after the Uttar Pradesh elections. 

If the Prime Minister and Shah are the stars of today’s wins, it also means that they also need to do a lot of re-think over the local leadership in both the states, particularly in Himachal.

For the estranged allies like the Shiv Sena and others like the TDP’s Chandrababu Naidu in Andhra Pradesh, the results must be heartening. Allies who are feeling cornered by the political might of  BJP can now rethink ahead of 2019. 

Won’t be a cakewalk in 2019; key takeaways for BJP

• BJP wins are all due to Prime Minister Modi and the formidable organisational skills of party chief Shah. 
• Prime Minister Modi continues to be the star of the BJP and its best bet to score victories 
• Shah has turned the BJP into an election winning machine with his impeccable booth-by-booth calculations and poll management skills
• BJP needs to dwell over prevailing distress in rural areas
• The saffron party can no longer stake copyright over the “Hindutva” brand. Reduction in seats in “Hindutva laboratory” of Gujarat shows its tested formula of majoritarianism is running out of steam. 
• BJP can no longer afford to ignore Rahul Gandhi and 2019 will not be a cakewalk. It is game-on for 2019
• Results show BJP is not as invincible, something that cornered allies can actually feel happy about.