The voter is a fickle animal. But knowing this can give the BJP little comfort. Weeks after crushing defeats in byelections for three Assembly seats in Uttarakhand (and in subsequent panchayat elections in the state), the saffron party has tasted sharp defeats in Assembly byelections in Bihar, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh, while in Punjab its ally Akali Dal was unable to upstage the Congress.
There can be arguments both ways on whether this reflects a nationwide mood, and whether dissatisfactions in relation to the Modi factor, which alone explains the BJP’s massive Lok Sabha win, are setting in. However, if a similar pattern of poll results is discernible in states with different political morphologies, it may not be a mere coincidence.
Nevertheless, any careful observer of the political scene would do well to maintain caution. It is not unthinkable that byelection results in a different set of states may not have been to the advantage of the Congress and its allies. Also, if the results of the present type can be mimicked in the four states of Maharashtra, Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand and Haryana, where Assembly elections will be held later this year, then the political mood in relation to the BJP can be better ascertained.
It will also be interesting to see if the Assembly polls in Bihar and UP — due over the next two years — will in some ways sustain the trend evident in the state byelections. No doubt, that would depend on whether the anti-BJP parties can show some degree of political and electoral convergence in tactics, as they did in Bihar, in order to counter the aggressive polarisation strategy that has been put in motion by the Hindutva forces, especially in relation to UP, which the BJP appears desperate to capture when Assembly elections are held.
The Bihar byelections, in particular, were an eye-opener. The poll percentage of the Congress-RJD-JDU combine showed an appreciable jump. In one case, its victory margin was 55,000 votes while the BJP’s margin of victory on one seat was as small as a few hundred votes. (Something not dissimilar occurred in Karnataka.) The upper caste polling was thought to be smaller than in the Lok Sabha poll, and many OBC votes swung away to the anti-BJP side compared with the Parliament election, confirming solid wins for the Congress and its regional partners with Lalu Yadav as their real leader.
Mr Yadav had been sought to be reviled as the enemy of development by his detractors, including sections of the media. But this did not impress voters who seemed more receptive to the strongly anti-communal pitch of the Congress and its allies. It does seem some change in voter behaviour is discernible. But a trend line has perhaps not been established.
