The Hindu : Anti-incumbency factor troubling BJP

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Feb 19, 2002

National

National

Anti-incumbency factor troubling BJP

By Neena Vyas

ALLAHABAD, FEB. 18. At the start of the Uttar Pradesh election campaign, the Chief Minister, Rajnath Singh, announced that he would seek a return to the `gaddi' in Lucknow on the basis of his performance. Although campaigning for the third and last phase of poll in the State will end tomorrow, there is no sign at all of the Bharatiya Janata Party trying to win votes because of `suraaj' or good governance.

The two main campaigners, the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, and the Home Minister, L.K. Advani, have been hammering away at Pakistan's wrong doings, its support for terrorism, India's resolve to crush the menace and so on. But the electorate has remained completely unmoved and is showing no sign of converting its anti-Pakistan mood into a pro-BJP vote and the ruling party has not been able to come up with any other issue. And there is a similar lack of enthusiasm for the Vishwa Hindu Parishad on the Ram temple front.

"It is an issueless election and unlike in the past when the BJP rode high on the basis of some emotional appeal. No one is moved by either terrorism or the Ram temple,'' said a lawyer at the Allahabad High Court. "The BJP's vote percentage will drop. Its Ministers will be on the run everywhere as they will face the brunt of the anti-incumbency factor,'' he added. He did not discount the possibility of the BJP forming the next Government through the "jod aur tod'' (break and make methodology). All this, he added was creating a sentiment in favour of the Congress, but it was a mood which the party has not been able to build.

The lawyer was perhaps referring to the fact that in Allahabad South the `beedi' king and Samajwadi Party candidate, Shyam Charan Gupta, was making the BJP heavyweight and Assembly Speaker, Kesri Nath Tripathi, sweat it out. Mr. Gupta's candidature threatened to bring the numerically considerable `baniyas' under the SP umbrella. In nearby Handia, Rakeshdhar Triparthi, a BJP Minister, was also under pressure from an SP candidate who was threatening to walk away with some of the `thakur' votes, and in Varanasi, the State Finance Minister, Harish Chandra Shrivastava, was having a hard time giving an account of the Rs.100 crores he claimed were spent on the City. Everywhere the anti-incumbency factor is eating into the BJP's support base. And few are willing to believe that it will not get fewer seats than the 56 it got in 1996.

If western U.P. which went to polls on February 14 was a BJP stronghold, and if tomorrow's polling will see the pro-SP areas cast their ballots, it will be the elections on February 21 that will decide the political fate of U.P. As many as 166 of the total of 403 Assembly segments will be going to the polls, and in 1996 the BJP and the SP were about evenly placed _ the BJP won about 56 seats, the SP 42. The Bahujan Samaj Party got around 30 and the Congress 15 (the last two saw some defections later).

In almost every district in eastern U.P. there are signs that suggest that the BJP will lose one or two seats.

The BSP which had lost ground badly between 1993 and 1996 is now trying to win back by fielding upper caste candidates, who it hopes will cut into the BJP's support base. In addition muscle power has also been added to ensure that the Dalits in this backward region are able to cast their votes.

But basically it seems to be a fight between the BJP and the SP. The SP will be trying to encash the anti-government mood even as it has tried to widen its support base by fielding candidates other than from the backward castes and Muslims.

The presence of the Apna Dal, which will take away the `kurmi' voters, mostly of the BJP, is another factor that could go against the ruling party.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

National