BJP losing youth support?

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, January 20

The incumbent BJP seems to be losing steam, particularly when it comes to the “youth connect” in the national capital, if the presence of crowd on Sunday at Ramlila Maidan here is anything to go by, ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

The sizeable chunk of vacant chairs notwithstanding, former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan — the saffron party’s star campaigner at today’s “Yuva Vijay Sankalp Maha” rally — questioned the Opposition parties’ alliance and its viability before he aggressively pitched for a second term for Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led BJP government at the Centre.

The three-time MP Chief Minister and BJP national vice-president claimed that the Opposition’s mahagathbandhan was rattled by the “popularity” of PM Modi, both in India and abroad, and the progress the country has made under his leadership.

He exhorted people to re-elect the BJP on the seven seats of Delhi and at the Centre, listing “weeding out corruption, action against black money and ensuring women safety” as the BJP’s planks for the upcoming General Election. Interestingly, while the issues had been part of party’s manifesto for 2014 elections as well, the Modi government itself is defending allegations of wrongdoings in Rafale deal.

Chouhan downplayed the coalition threat referring to the politically-tough tenures of former Prime Ministers HD Deve Gowda and Inder Kumar Gujral in 1996-1998 and took a swipe on the Congress too.

Even in the past, the Opposition parties had formed a United Front and its short-lived fate is now history, Chauhan said, indicating at possible power struggle among the regional parties that form the anti-BJP alliance for primeministership once the elections are over.