BHUBANESWAR: After the drubbing at the hands of Biju Janata Dal (BJD) in the recently held simultaneous elections to Assembly and Lok Sabha, Odisha BJP has undertaken an exercise to analyse what went wrong for the party despite a massive wave in favour of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
A three-member committee has been appointed for each of the 21 Parliamentary seats to analyse the poll data and submit a report to the party indicating the BJP performance in each booth compared to the 2104 elections.
“The objective of this review is to assess the strength and weakness of the party in each booth. Once we got to know our weak links, we will take corrective measures to strengthen our position,” said State BJP general secretary Dilip Mohanty.
The microanalysis of the poll results of Assembly and Lok Sabha will give a clear picture of the BJP’s position in each booth which is the smallest unit in the organisational structure, he said.
“We have started this exercise from each Assembly segment of a Parliamentary constituency for better understanding. This will take time but the analysis will be perfect,” Mohanty said.
The booth-wise scrutiny of poll results is being undertaken at a time when the party is gearing up for holding organisational elections.
This will enable the BJP to formulate a strategy on how to improve its position where its organisation is weak.
Besides, this will give an important insight into selection of candidates as a majority of the Assembly candidates lost the election by a slender margin.
The BJP managed to win 23 Assembly seats to replace the Congress, which bagged just nine, as the main opposition party in the state.
Though the saffron party improved its vote share in the Assembly elections with a 14.3 per cent increase from 18.2 per cent in 2014 to 32.5 per cent in 2019, it could not convert this growth into seats.
In the Parliamentary elections, BJP improved its tally significantly in the Lok Sabha by winning eight and registering growth in vote share from 21.5 per cent in 2014 to 38.4 per cent in 2019.
BJP performed poorly in the Assembly polls despite the party boasting a record 36 lakh membership enrolment and formation of committees in about 36,000 booths for micro-management of elections at the grassroots level.