PM Modi's 35-day whirlwind nationwide tour gives BJP big boost ahead of polls

With the Election Commission announcing on Saturday (March 16) the dates for the upcoming general elections that will decide if the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will be able to make history by returning to power for the third consecutive term, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has tried to give the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) an edge over the Opposition by visiting all the important states at least twice in the last month.

In an effort to catch the Opposition parties off-guard and give the ruling BJP the first mover’s advantage, the PM has already travelled across the country at least twice in the last 35 days. Since the end of the interim Budget on February 10, when the Parliament adjourned sine die, Modi has followed a carefully managed plan in which he has visited all the important states at least twice, with a special focus on South India, West Bengal, and the northeast.

More than 70 public meetings, road shows in 35 days

Senior leaders of the BJP said that PM Modi took part in more than 70 public meetings and road shows across India in the last 35 days and has also ensured that the BJP is the first party to announce the names of the candidates even before the announcement of the dates of the Lok Sabha polls by the Election Commission.

“The Opposition is in a state of slumber. They have no idea that PM Narendra Modi has already travelled all over the country twice in the last month. The BJP leadership is also the first political party to announce names of 267 candidates in the first two lists which is about 50 percent of the total 543 Lok Sabha seats. PM Modi has also spoken in detail about the guarantees and populist schemes that the BJP government under him will try to fulfill for the economically and socially weaker sections,” RP Singh, national spokesperson of the BJP, told The Federal.

The PM has asked the BJP workers to ensure that the party wins at least 370 Lok Sabha seats and the NDA more than 400 seats.

Most senior leaders busy

Explaining BJP’s plan for the 2024 general elections, senior leaders of the BJP also said that apart from the public meetings and road shows of PM Modi, other senior leaders like Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Home Minister Amit Shah, Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and BJP president JP Nadda have also traveled to different states to campaign for the party and also check the election preparedness of the state units.

Realizing that the members of the NDA are dependent on the electoral performance of the BJP, senior leaders of the saffron party have decided that the party will contest at least 460-470 Lok Sabha seats in the upcoming polls. This is the first time the BJP will contest over 460 seats. During the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP contested 437 Lok Sabha seats and won 303 seats on its own.

“If we listen to the speeches of PM Modi in the last month, he has made it clear that the election is important because the Centre has set a target of making India a developed nation by 2047. He has also clearly stated that the union government will take many big decisions in the third term and also the promise to continue to work for GYAN, that is G for Garib (poor), Yuva (youth), Annadata (farmers), and Nari (women). The PM has already announced the manifesto of the party,” Singh further said.

BJP’s southern focus

Coming under criticism from Opposition parties that the BJP is a marginal player in the southern region of the country, senior leaders of the BJP are of the opinion that the party should win seats in every southern state in the upcoming general elections.

Although the BJP won 29 out of the 130 Lok Sabha seats in five southern states during the 2019 general elections, the party failed to win a single seat in at least three southern states - Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Andhra Pradesh.

Senior leaders of the BJP are hopeful, and even Modi has often claimed that the BJP will win seats in Tamil Nadu and Kerala in the Lok Sabha polls. In his recent country-wide tour, he already visited Tamil Nadu at least three times in the last 20 days, Kerala at least twice between February 27 and March 15, and he has taken part in public meetings in Telangana at least thrice from March 5 to March 15.

Taking note of the jibes of Opposition parties, the senior leaders of the BJP asked senior union ministers like Rajeev Chandrashekhar and V Muraleedharan to contest elections from Kerala to give a boost to the party’s chances. It is expected that more union ministers could be asked to contest elections in the states of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh to help the BJP improve its tally in the south.

Trouble within NDA in north India

Even as the BJP leadership has tried to streamline its own election campaign for the 2024 challenge, the going is not as good as it seems within the NDA as at least two allies have walked out of the ruling alliance in the last few days.

To make matters worse, the BJP leadership has not been able to announce a seat-sharing formula with any of its alliance partners in the crucial states of Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, and Bihar, and the party has already broken ties with Jannayak Janata Party (JJP) in Haryana.

While the alliances of the BJP in the southern part of the country with Janata Dal Secular (JDS) in Karnataka and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) in Andhra Pradesh seem more sorted out in terms of seat-sharing arrangements, it is the alliance partners in north India who are creating problems for the BJP.

“We are only asking for our sitting seats and respect within the alliance. Talks are going on between the BJP leadership and our party. Let us wait for the final outcome of the seat-sharing talks,” Sanjay Saraf, senior leader and national spokesperson of Rashtriya Lok Janshakti Party (RLJP) told The Federal.

The RLJP leadership is the latest NDA partner who has sounded the bugle of rebellion.

The seat-sharing talks in Maharashtra are also taking some time to be resolved as the BJP has already announced the names of the candidates in at least 20 Lok Sabha constituencies. The remaining 28 seats will now be divided between the BJP, the Shiv Sena under Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) under Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar.

BJP’s election campaign well planned

Political analysts believe that the BJP has managed to plan its own campaign with clinical precision and the problems within the NDA will also get resolved in the coming days.

“If we look at the electoral plans of PM Modi and the BJP, the ruling party has planned everything. The PM has already toured the entire country, names of candidates have also been announced, and it is only the seat-sharing arrangement with alliance partners that is being worked out. The Opposition is in disarray, and they are busy confronting each other rather than the BJP. Until the Opposition parties are able to solve their differences, PM Modi will always have the edge in elections,” SK Dwivedi, former political science professor at Lucknow University told The Federal.