In the Booth

In the 182 seat Gujarat Assembly, the recently concluded 2022 election results gifted 156 seats to the BJP which was 52. 50% of total votes. The Congress got 17 seats or 27.

28% of total votes polled. With a mere 5 seats to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), this new entrant could muster only 12. 92% of total votes.

If the Congress and AAP vote percentages are added it would be 40. 20%. That implies the BJP is ahead of both these two parties combined by 12.

30% votes. While the Samajwadi Party got 1 seat only, 3 seats have gone to Independents. One of the Independents is said to be a BJP rebel.

In the 2017 Gujarat Assembly polls, while 99 seats had been won by the BJP, the Congress had mustered an impressive 78 seats. These figures, even though sketchy, offer a very clear picture of what is happening in elections. It is true that enormous amounts of money are being spent by the ruling parties, wherever they may be in power, to regain power in their respective constituencies.

However, it may not be absolutely correct to say that only money decides the fate of politicians in India today. This argument can be strengthened by taking the example of Himachal Pradesh results where the Congress, in its present weakened form without access to big money, could defeat the BJP which was already in power since December 2017. What then drives Indian democracy is a question that should be rankling any political thinker.

Admittedly, democracy in India has shrunk to the base process of voting only. Once voted to power, present day politicians seem happy to pander to the idea of creating a ‘Deep State’. A state which does not respond to citizens and tries to bar them from accessing any information, even bare data concerning where tax payers’ money is being spent, as seen in the new Data Protection Bill, will be a monster that could devour anything and everything.

For example, the small yet very significant military skirmish between the Indian and Chinese armies on 9 December 2022 should open the eyes of all citizens of this country. This incident, the true magnitude of which is still unknown, indicates an utter failure of Indian diplomacy in the immediate neighborhood as also political bravado of the BJP and its leadership. Failure of diplomacy is predictable since the onus lies on a retired Indian Foreign Service (IFS) bureaucrat who never shone while in service.

That shows how pitifully man power deprived the BJP is in terms of foreign policy comprehension. All neighboring countries of India stand inimical to it. With this situation in mind and the latest Chinese aggression, one can feel shaky when hearing rumors that a ‘small, limited and controlled’ war would be waged to retrieve Pak occupied Kashmir (PoK) areas to create a nationalistic fervor prior to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

The current events are a clear warning that if India dares to change the status quo in PoK through military adventurism, the situation may not remain small nor limited and the outcome would certainly not be controlled by the Indian forces alone. If one looks further into the matter, the victories by the BJP seem to be predictable in some ways. As long as the voting is on religious sentiments, especially in areas where Moslems had previously been aggressive and antagonistic, the BJP seems to enjoy an upper hand.

Interestingly, according to early reports by the Election Commission, urban voter turnout even in Gujarat this time was very low. This could be an indication of fatigue shown by conscious Gujarati voters whom many so called liberals are ready to condemn. On the other hand, where voting is anything but religion based, the dices do not necessarily fall in favor of the BJP.

States like Bihar, Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Jharkhand and even Orissa are some glaring examples. It has also to be pointed out that the Moslem population in these states has consistently tried to play cool and has remained under the radar for a very long time in history. Although Hyderabad was earlier known for its aggressive Moslem population that jumped into riot like situations earlier, the rural parts of Telangana and also Andhra do not seem to keep wounds festering on communal lines.

The future of India now depends not only on the rabid and illogical Hindutva types but equally on the violently aggressive Moslems who have nothing to show in their past activities to prove any point against their so called present day oppressors. .