General Election Results 2024 and the BJP

The 2024 general election results came as a surprise for everyone. Even surprising was the decrease in the margin of victory for the Prime Minister which came down to 1.5 lakh from around 5 lakh votes in 2019. The results lay bare the vulnerabilities for the BJP which until now was seen as invincible. But beyond a somber victory euphoria, there is a silver lining for the party to do a course correction regarding its inner functioning and future as an organization before it is too late.

With Narendra Modi's popularity second to none and a streak of victories for the BJP in state assemblies following the landslide in 2014 the BJP saw a Congressisation of its inner functioning. A high command was now calling the shots, and Modi's popularity seemed the solution for everything. This change was in contrast with Narendra Modi being nominated as the BJP's PM nominee before the 2014 general election despite stiff opposition from party stalwarts like L K Advani, Murali Manohar Joshi, and Sushma Swaraj. The stark irony of the rise of Modi is it destroyed or substantially weakened the very thing that ensured he became the party's PM nominee for the 2014 general elections i.e. decentralization of power within the party.

The undermining of state-level leadership and the appointment of lightweight chief ministers or using every trick in the realpolitik handbook to capture and retain power seemed to work just fine until it did not. The setback in UP showed that Modi's popularity has limitations while the seat tally in Maharashtra is a clear message to the BJP regarding the extent to which people are okay with it playing hard realpolitik. The distribution of tickets to turncoats also fell on its face for the BJP as a majority of them lost the elections. The BJP's credibility took a huge blow because yesterday's accused were now acquitted after joining the BJP. It was a clear message from the people that power should be a means to an end not the end itself. Now one could argue that correlation is not causation as BJP after all did get 240 seats with vote share remaining more or less the same and just last winter won three state assembly elections quite handsomely. But if you carefully observe, the BJP eventually deferred to the state leadership and accommodated them after trying to cut them to size right in time to save the day, Madhya Pradesh is a case in point. The rise of the BJP to power in Odisha, and an increase in its vote share in Tamil Nadu, Kerala indicate the importance of state-level leadership and state cadre. Thus having a popular leader at the top should not be a substitute for strong leadership at the state level.

BJP has always been known for its good human resource management and policy. It has always rewarded people with merit and competence, which is a reason for its gradual rise from a meek existence to complete political domination. To avoid the leadership question in the short term the BJP has now overt dependence on Modi to swing elections for the party's candidates. It seems that to stay in power today the Modi-Shah BJP is willing to ignore the question of the party's future and build the next line of leadership. And the 2024 election result might just be the opportunity for the party to press a reset.

Image Credits: Bhatatiya Janata Party