It’s neither Shivraj Singh Chauhan, nor Vasundhara Raje nor Raman Singh. The BJP has chosen three different leaders as chief ministers in all three States which once belonged to the political stalwarts mentioned above. The new faces are not all that popular and in fact are almost unknown.
BJP not only surprised their own party members by picking up unknown leaders but also tried to keep its image as an inclusive party through smartly calculated caste equations. Of course, the BJP through their choices also made it clear that they do not want the negative impressions of public towards their once formidable leaders affect the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. Chattisgarh’s CM Vishnu Deo Sai belongs to tribal community, Madhya Pradesh’s CM Mohan Yadav is from the OBC, while Rajasthan’s CM Bhajan Lal Sharma, a debutant MLA, hails from a Brahmin family. The only common link between all these three leaders is their close association with RSS.
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The saffron party did not just stop here but it is evident that they have thought thoroughly while choosing deputy chief ministers as well. In Madhya Pradesh, while the CM belongs to the OBC community, deputy chief ministers Rajendra Shukla is a Brahmin and the other Dy CM Jagdish Devda is from SC category. In Rajasthan, along with Brahmin CM, Rajput and Dalit leaders were appointed as deputy CMs in Diya Kumari and Premchand Bairwa, respectively.
In short, BJP through its social engineering tried to satisfy everyone possible. BJP has succeeded in engraving another crucial factor in party workers’ hearts and minds. Although Amit Shah and Narendra Modi are the two leaders in the party to have the final word, multiple meetings were held with old as well as new karyakartas while zeroing in on the names of all three chief ministers. All in all, BJP has tremendously succeeded in creating an impression that the party runs democratically. On the contrary, Congress may always bang the drum about the party being run democratically but the front cover, back cover and first 12 pages of their annual democratic party edition has never changed.
BJP has closely studied Congress’ success as well as failures and so they take steps accordingly and carefully. According to some BJP leaders in Maharashtra, the party has already started taking steps to counter the response Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra received in the State. For example, BJP was under the impression that Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra would not receive much response in Marathwada region; however, this is where the campaign actually witnessed tremendous success. The BJP has thoroughly analysed why, how and what factors behind the Yatra’s success in the respective region and are ready with solutions to counter the situation. Through such studies, BJP picked up three fresh faces for the posts of chief minister. By picking an OBC leader as CM in Madhya Pradesh over seasoned Chauhan, Tomar, Scindia and Vijayvargiya, BJP has sent a clear signal that the ones causing a split will not be entertained. Their decision to pick Mohan Yadav as MP’s chief minister is also a way to show voters from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh that the party is not against Yadavs. The saffron party had also allocated candidacies by keeping in mind the caste equations, which is why the party got not one or two but 12 members of parliament to contest the Assembly elections. And 10 out of those 12 candidates even won the elections. This shows BJP’s micromanagement skills ahead of 2024 general elections which the party will definitely intend to clean sweep.
While the victories in three major States have increased the BJP’s confidence manifold, the conflict within the INDIA front is brewing and coming to the fore. There is no doubt that ‘revadi’ announcements will be made from both the sides as assembly elections already showed the voters a preview of it. The parties have gone as far as announcing to deposit money straight into the people’s bank accounts as opposed to the previous trends where people were promised certain goods and concessions in political manifestos. However, merely making announcements doesn’t guarantee success in political elections, which is why one has to indulge in clever tactics. For now, the dice is falling in favour of the BJP. Indeed, just having Chanakya is not enough and so one also requires Shakuni to play the game of politics, and currently Congress lacks both.
