The moment evaluation of the Haryana Meeting elections illustrates the issue with our political commentary. To borrow a cricket metaphor, we search to clarify the result of each match as if it was an “innings defeat”, the place one group outperformed the opposite in each respect. Regardless of the winner did was proper and regardless of the loser did was incorrect.
What makes the BJP’s victory in Haryana so politically consequential was the staggering hole between expectation and end result, not the hole between winner and loser. The vote share hole between the BJP and Congress is lower than 1 per cent. In cricket phrases, the Haryana election was a T-20 match that ought to have been received with two overs to spare, however was dragged until the final ball, after which misplaced. So, we have to clarify three issues: Why did we anticipate it to be a straightforward affair? Why was it dragged until the final ball? Why was it misplaced? So, for Haryana, we have to perceive the structural causes for Congress’s perceived benefit, the strategic components that helped the BJP neutralise it and the tactical strikes that resulted in an unlikely victory for the BJP.
A statutory clarification earlier than I flip to those questions. I write this on the belief that the outcome as declared by the EC is a good reflection of the way in which individuals voted. Congress has raised severe objections to the outcomes, offered some proof to assist its declare and promised extra. The onus is on the EC to make clear. For now, I’ve taken the official outcomes, counter-intuitive as they’re, at face worth and bracketed all different considerations about manipulation.
Allow us to start by understanding the structural shift Congress loved firstly of this election. The occasion suffered a dramatic collapse of its vote share in Haryana — from round 40 per cent — to Lok Sabha elections of 2014 (23 per cent), meeting elections the identical yr (21 per cent), 2019 LS elections (29 per cent) and meeting elections (28 per cent). In LS elections of 2019, it trailed the BJP by practically 30 proportion factors. Haryana Congress was staring on the destiny of its counterparts in UP and Bihar. That is the place the farmers’ motion and the wrestlers’ protest modified the political panorama, weaning away the dominant farming neighborhood from the BJP. Congress revival after the Bharat Jodo Yatra made positive that the disaffected farmers turned to Congress fairly than the INLD or JJP. Rahul Gandhi’s aggressive pitch on the Structure helped convey an enormous chunk of Dalit voters again to Congress.
This was mirrored within the LS elections, because the vote share of Congress (together with AAP) made an enormous leap of 19 proportion factors to complete 1 proportion level forward of the BJP. So, opposite to post-poll commentaries, kisan, pahalwan and samvidhan did work. Else, Congress wouldn’t have been a severe contender in these elections. Anti-incumbency in opposition to the 10-year-old state authorities was palpable on the bottom. The plain expectation was that the BJP would fare a lot worse within the meeting elections, because it had achieved in 2014 and 2019. So, in an more and more bipolar scenario (the mixed vote share of Congress and BJP rose from 55 per cent in 2014 to 79 per cent on this meeting election), that will have meant a decisive defeat for the BJP and a cushty majority for Congress.
However this structural benefit was not sufficient to win elections. This was the error within the kisan-jawan-pahalwan-samvidhan narrative. I used to be among the many many analysts who believed that this preliminary structural benefit for Congress was massive and irreversible within the quick run, sufficient to soak up the impact of any strategic or tactical transfer by the BJP. Though, in contrast to within the LS elections, I kept away from making a proper seats forecast for the Haryana meeting, I shared the widespread perception {that a} comfy majority (or a wave or perhaps a tsunami) for Congress was on the playing cards.
The BJP strategists have been sensible sufficient to see a possibility in adversity. They might see that the large shift in the direction of Congress got here largely from the Jats. And there was a possibility to separate the Dalit votes in view of the sub-quota controversy. By all accounts, they went about executing their technique meticulously.
The one method of creating sense of this end result is to see it because of a sequence of strategic strikes by the BJP that neutralised the large preliminary benefit loved by Congress. These strikes included substitute of Manohar Lal Khattar by Nayab Singh Saini and a sequence of bulletins meant to handle the weak factors of the BJP. This technique concerned a daring resolution to disclaim tickets to many sitting MLAs and massive leaders. Quietly, the BJP pressed the 35-1 (pitting 35 communities of the state in opposition to Jats) polarisation technique. This was much like the “Yadav raj” technique utilized by the BJP efficiently in opposition to the SP within the UP meeting elections of 2022. In Haryana the BJP invoked the worry of raj by one neighborhood, one district, one household. This was not a brand new technique, the BJP used it in 2019 too. Though floor reviews don’t counsel larger polarisation this time, that is essentially the most believable clarification for the BJP’s surprising success. This was supplemented by a quiet marketing campaign among the many non-Jatav SCs on the problem of the sub-quota.
Congress, then again, both didn’t have a transparent technique or couldn’t execute it. Whereas Rahul assured a authorities of all “36 biradari”, the occasion couldn’t carry this assurance, particularly to the voters of south Haryana and GT Street area populated by non-Jats. The choice to renominate all sitting MLAs confirmed complacency — 14 of the 28 sitting Congress MLAs misplaced the election. Additionally, the ticket distribution carried the stamp of 1 chief and bolstered the impression of Jat dominance. Kumari Selja’s not-so-quiet protest didn’t damage the occasion in her personal areas, however it accentuated the BJP’s narrative of Congress as a Jat occasion. Whereas there was no electoral achieve in making an alliance with the AAP or SP, there was a level of complacency in addressing official and unofficial “rebels”.
These strategic disparities introduced the electoral match all the way down to the final over, to the polling day. That is an space the place the BJP has an unmistakable benefit over the Congress, with its micro-targeting of voters, polling sales space administration and last-minute mobilisation. Congress relied on hawa, enthusiasm and voters’ self-mobilisation. These seemingly small however crucial components give the BJP as much as a 2 per cent spike in each election, in each state. Within the final occasion, that seems to have tilted this shut election in favour of the BJP and resulted in what could be described as an unprecedented and historic verdict. As within the T-20 finals, one catch can change the match.
The author is member, Swaraj India and Nationwide Convenor of Bharat Jodo Abhiyaan
