Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, May 15: After the BJP’s over-reliance on the prime minister Narendra Modi and other central leaders to bail the party out in the state elections failed in Karnataka, the ruling party is learnt to be planning to change its strategy for the coming elections to four more states later this year by giving more importance to the local leaders.
The BJP’s pre-election move in Karnataka to hike the reservation quota for the scheduled castes and tribes also did not pay off. While the party failed to secure a single ST-reserved seat — it won seven last time — its tally of SC-reserved constituencies dropped from 16 in 2018 to 12. In contrast, the Congress won 21of the 36 SC-reserved seats and swept the ST seats by winning 14 of 15 while one went to the Janata Dal (Secular). Both these numbers mark a big increase for the Congress, which won seven ST seats and 12 SC seats in 2018.
The party sources said the Karnataka crash has pushed the BJP to tweak its campaign template for the next round of state elections due later this year. Four crucial states are going to polls — Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana and Chhattisgarh. Of these, only Madhya Pradesh is ruled by the BJP and the party is hoping to cash in on the revolving door policy in Rajasthan and anti-incumbency in the two others to work in its favour.
Some senior party leaders said the BJP had decided to keep caste equations in mind while deciding the leadership issue and candidates in all four states. This was a hard lesson from Karnataka, where its decision to remove BS Yediyurappa from the top post and deny ticket to Jagdish Shettar and Laxman Sadavi pushed the Lingayats towards the Congress.
If need be, the party is also open to electoral alliances with smaller parties, sources said. There is speculation that joining forces with HD Kumaraswamy in Karnataka would have helped the BJP in a handful of seats.
The biggest change, though, would be the focus on local leaders instead of the overwhelming reliance on Central leaders and state Chief Ministers. Allowing local leaders to craft the campaign had worked well for the Congress.
Not only the Congress, the BJP too is rigged by factionalism almost in all the states going to the polls. Factionalism will be reined in. In Karnataka, it was seen as a key problem that led to denial of ticket to leaders like Jagdish Shettar. This strategy will be crucial in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, where lack of cohesion is one of the biggest challenges facing the party.
Sources said in Madhya Pradesh, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan would remain the face of the party but he would be asked to take other leaders like Jyotiraditya Scindia, Narendra Singh Tomar and BD Sharma along with him. Scindia and his loyalists who joined the BJP in 2020 toppling the Kamal Nath government in the process, have been seen as outsiders. Distribution of ticket has been a process fraught with bickering.
In Rajasthan, former Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje – seen to be out of sync with the Central leadership — will be given preference. But state leaders belonging to different caste groups like Kirori Lal Meena, Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, Satish Poonia and others will also be given importance.
In Chhattisgarh, former Chief Minister Raman Singh, senior leader Brijmohan Agrawal, Arun Sao will be given importance and in Telangana, Bandi Sajay, E Rajendran, G Kishan Reddy will be key faces for the party. State leaders will be asked to sort out their differences and to present a united face of the party, sources said.
In MP, the only state under the BJP going to the polls, the party high command would insist on better coordination between the government and the organisation to plug the loophole. Ground lever workers will be given importance. Their feedback would play an important role in deciding issues, promises and strategy instead of merely highlighting the performance of the central government under Modi promoting the “double engine” concept, the sources said.