There are two Indias - the Hindi heartland and the rest of the country. Of the 317 Lok Sabha constituencies in the non-Hindi speaking areas, the BJP got just 91 seats in 2014, about 29 per cent of total seats, whereas the party’s strike rate was 90 per cent in the Hindi-speaking areas that stretch from Haryana to Bihar. It won 192 of the 226 seats in the region. Allies won another 11 seats.
The Ganga River has flown as polluted since then. Having reached its peak performance five years ago, the BJP graph can only go down. The party has to focus on the rest of the country to make up for the shortfall in its core areas. That explains the party’s growing interest in east India, particularly Bengal.
The BJP won only 11 of the 88 seats from Bengal and other eastern states in 2014. This time BJP president Amit Shah has given the party’s Bengal unit a target of sending 23 MPs.
The major battles for New Delhi will be fought in the Hindi heartland as always. The BJP has reasons to worry. Opposition parties have formed a bulwark in Bihar and Jharkhand, while Priyanka Gandhi’s entry into active politics may tilt the balance in eastern Uttar Pradesh. The BJP success hinges on its performance in east India.
The Medinipur route
The BJP office in Kharagpur in Medinipur district works out of a fenced-off railway building on the suburb. The party might have chosen this remote location to stay off the radar of aggressive Trinamool Congress workers. The party is assured of the support of railway authorities and other central government institutions. All senior leaders are guarded by central police personnel.
The BJP's poll observer Bijoy Banerjee looked contended in the party office. He counts West Medinipur as a bright spot for the party unless the Trinamool Congress scares away the voters from the polling booths.
BJP’s candidate in the constituency is the party’s state president, Dilip Ghosh, who campaigns safe in a ring of CRPF personnel. “This will be a historic election. We will win 23 seats,” he said as a group of youngsters covered in saffron shawls chanted, “Mein bhi chowkidar.”
The election to the local self-governing bodies in 2018 was something like a dress rehearsal for the general election. About 34 per cent of the seats were virtually uncontested in an election marred by large-scale violence. The ruling Trinamool Congress won most of those seats. The BJP emerged a distant second in many districts, changing the political map of Bengal.
The BJP is in a better position to claim the anti-incumbency votes in the state as the CPM and the Congress moved further to the margins.
The ‘Devi’ of Ranaghat
In Nadia district’s Ranaghat, we came across the youngest candidate in India. Rupali Biswas was too young to run for the Lok Sabha when the election was notified. She turned 25 on March 28.
In a way, she resembled the protagonist of Satyajit Ray’s ‘Devi’. The character played by Sharmila Tagore was considered an avatar of the goddess by her husband’s family. The myth gradually spread to the locality and finally to the young woman herself.
Biswas was catapulted to sudden glory after her husband, Sathyajit Biswas, a Trinamool MLA, was shot dead two months ago. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee chose the slain leader’s wife as the candidate of Ranaghat.
The young woman in a blue sari stood dazed amid the crowd. Senior leaders thronged her with directions. “I am going through a difficult phase,” she told me. “But I am happy to take up this honour bestowed on me by didi.”
Banerjee preferred Biswas to the sitting MP for two reasons, political commentators said. Banerjee is known to deal with fighting factions within the party by introducing an outsider. Ranaghat is the latest instance of that tactic. Another instance is the candidature of Mimi Chakraborty in Jadavpur. The 30-year-old actor may be Banerjee’s way of telling the cadre that the party is firmly in the grip of its leader. The chief minister’s confidence is not entirely unfounded.
Banerjee counts as her pillar of strength the support of the Muslims, who form about 30 per cent of the state’s population. Her government’s welfare programmes, including the globally noted Kanyasree scheme for girls, have added to her popularity. The Trinamool Congress organisation works efficiently up to the booth level.
The party colours of blue and white are everywhere in Kolkata. The long flyovers thats sprawls over the city’s notorious traffic snarls are covered in blue and white. Even street lamps sport blue and white lights. Didi never lets the people forget her.
