Feb 13 bypolls: Acid test for national parties?

Unpredictable as it is, the voting pattern of the electorate during bypolls has often been at variance with what the logical, clinical analysts would like to assume. A point to ponder would be the setbacks that the Modi government received in Uttar Pradesh when they lost a majority of their assembly seats during the 2015 bye elections

The New Year had begun well for the Bharatiya Janata Party, recovering as it was, from the crushing, sledgehammer blow that it received from the Nitish-Laloo combine, the two regional titans of Bihar during the elections held there in October-November.

Back in home ground Gujarat, the Choryasi Assembly seat bypoll held in January gave it the booster shot when the party triumphed over its traditional rival, the Congress, by more than 43,000 votes.

It more or less smoothened the ruffled feathers it had encountered when the Hardik Patel led-agitation had nibbled away the rural voteshare which it had effortlessly maintained for more than a decade, during the municipal polls held recently.

With the party, in alliance with Telugu Desam, virtually blown away during the recent Hyderabad municipal elections, from the local and the national points of view, the dozen constituencies going to the polls on February 13 are bound to garner commensurate attention.

One-third of those seats were with the Congress, three with Samajwadi Party, one with Shiv Sena and CPI (M) respectively. Two seats out of this 12 were with the BJP, both in Karnataka. Other than this, the seat in Bihar was held by its ally, Rashtriya Lok Samata Party. Superficially, one may conclude that if the saffron party retains its three seats, then it can legitimately consider itself breaking even at the hustings.

Still, a closer analysis of the eight states where the elections are to be held next week, reveals that at least in five out of them Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Punjab the NDA is either the ruling party, shares power or was the ruling party a term ago.

Unpredictable as it is, the voting pattern of the electorate during bypolls has often been at variance with what the logical, clinical analysts would like to assume. A point to ponder would be the setbacks that the Modi government received in Uttar Pradesh when they lost a majority of their assembly seats during the 2015 bye elections.

As a test case of what lies in store in the summer of 2016 and whether it is going to be Modi’s annus horribilis, an extension of his torrid time faced in 2015 as some media circles would like to portray, the ruling party at the Centre , anyhow, would like to kickstart a winning momentum.

While the need for intense campaigning in Karnataka is still not top priority for BJP as the next elections are due only in 2018, Tripura and Telangana are low on the bucket list owing to its stature in both the States.

Bihar also is ruled out for the same reason and also that its ally would be keener to retain it, given the depleted strength it has in the current assembly. In Maharashtra, with Shiv Sena in the ring, the BJP which holds the parliamentary slot in Palghar may yet stay away. This leaves out Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, where elections would be held in 2017, following the ones in 2016.

This time around, Muzaffar Nagar in UP, too, is featured in the elections where the BJP presence has been aggressive, other than in the entire State where the extreme elements of the Hindu camp have been drumming up communal feelings. Ideally, the NDA would like to keep this seat with itself, apart from the others where it can polarise votes and mount a sustained campaign to capture Lucknow next year.

Punjab would be a test case as would be Madhya Pradesh, where BJP would have to work harder to wrest the seat from Congress, battling incumbency and the rising popularity of Aam Aadmi Party in the former. In the Shivraj Singh Chouhan ruled MP, it would just add up to the tally of BJP, where it has nearly three-fourth of its MLAs mounting a stiff challenge to the others in Bhopal assembly. How India decides will be known on February 16, the outcome of which will unleash a fresh wave of political action all across the country.

Constituencies going to polls
State Constituency Held by
Telangana Narayankhed Congress
Karnataka Bidar BJP
Karnataka Devadurga (ST) Congress
Karnataka Hebbal BJP
Maharashtra Palghar (ST) Shiv Sena
Madhya Pradesh Maihar Congress
Uttar Pradesh Bikapur Samajwadi Party
Uttar Pradesh Deoband Samajwadi Party
Uttar Pradesh Muzaffarnagar Samajwadi Party
Bihar Harlakhee RLSP
Punjab Khadoor Sahib Congress
Tripura Amarpur CPI(M)