NEW DELHI: The outcome of the first major nationwide bypolls after the second wave of the Covid pandemic may leave the BJP more worried than excited in the run up to key electoral battles early next year. Even if one sets aside the BJP’s downhill journey in Bengal, the Congress sweep in Himachal Pradesh seemingly sent out a loud message that the hill states invariably votes out incumbent governments. The BJP will also need to worry for not making any gains in Rajasthan where the saffron outfit is still struggling to address the leadership issue.
The party will count on the victories in Assam and Madhya Pradesh where the incumbent chief ministers Himanta Biswa Sarma and Shivraj Singh Chouhan delivered a perfect result. The BJP failed to defend two Lok Sabha constituencies, losing Dadra and Nagar Haveli to friend the Shiv Sena and Mandi to the Congress.
BJP chief J P Nadda is likely to come under pressure, as the party was routed in three Assembly seats and one Lok Sabha constituency. Besides anti-incumbency factor firming up, the BJP was also hit hard by the infighting within its ranks, with the state leadership failing to project a united house.
The BJP continues to gain in Assam from Sarma’s elevation as the chief minister by making inroads into the Congress support base. The BJP led alliance won all the five Assembly seats in the state. The pattern is also paying rich dividends to the BJP in Madhya Pradesh, with the induction of Jyotiraditya Scindia giving the party additional electoral muscle.
The win in Huzurabad will cheer the party leadership as Telangana is on top of the states where it wants to expand in the near future. The BJP and the RSS are working in tandem to gain from the vacuum in the Opposition space.
In Bengal, the party is seemingly faced with the hard lessons that such short-cuts are tough to maintain. Out of the four Assembly seats that it lost in Bengal, the BJP had won Dinhata and Santipur just a few months ago.