Covid-19 vaccination success to be BJP's mantra before assembly polls

Party passes resolution saying it would achieve victory in all forthcoming state elections

Praising the Narendra Modi government’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic by achieving more than a billion vaccinations ‘in an orderly and organised way”, the BJP national executive passed a resolution announcing it would achieve victory in all the forthcoming assembly elections. 

Responding to this, Modi asked workers to become a ‘bridge of faith’ between ordinary Indians and said activists must draw on the traditions of ‘service’ (seva) of the party to highlight the good work done by the state as well as the central governments.

This is a party of workers, not of a family, he told workers. He also said whether it was vaccinations, or India’s net zero and climate commitments, the world had taken note of the country’s achievements.

The wording of the resolution and the subsequent briefings by Union ministers Dharmendra Pradhan, Nirmala Sitharaman and Bhupender Yadav made it clear that the party would project Covid management by the Centre as its biggest achievement in election campaigns. Chiefs ministers and party chiefs of five poll-bound states made presentations before the executive.

Finance minister Sitharaman said, “Within 48 hours of announcing the lockdown, we came up with giving people food for free for eight full months – for 80 crore people.”

She said affordable medicines were being made available to the poor and the middle class. Also, over 75,000 health and wellness centres have been set up across the country. She criticised opposition parties for questioning the Centre’s vaccination programme. The finance minister said, “While remembering the commendable work of vaccination done in India and all over the world, we are also remembering how the opposition parties had raised many questions on vaccination from the very beginning.”

The party also referred to its recent setbacks in a host of elections – the panchayat elections in Uttar Pradesh earlier in the year and losses in several state by-elections, including Himachal Pradesh, where the BJP could not get a single seat. Responding to a questioner, Sitharaman referred briefly to the party’s by-election performance and said it was discussed.

However, Sitharaman said every delegate who spoke, referred to West Bengal – where the party failed to defeat the Trinamool Congress (TMC). It had seen defections to the TMC on a large scale. The BJP had committed to countering “violence and atrocities” against its workers in Bengal. Before her, Pradhan said, “We will fight back democratically.”

In a departure from the past, the party presented and passed only one resolution – the political resolution. It covered everything from hike in allocations for the health and social security sector in the Union Budget 2021-22 to programmes like Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.

The resolution said it was ready to hold a dialogue with farmers on the three laws passed recently – over which an alliance partner, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) walked out. However, there was no reference to revisiting the laws already passed.

In an earlier briefing, Pradhan said the party will set up committees in all 1.04 million polling booths by Decem­ber 25 and deploy panna pramukhs (voter list in-charges) by April 6 next year. It would also institutionalise Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Mann Ki Baat in every booth in the next six months.

At the inaugural speech, party chief J P Nadda quoted his predecessor Amit Shah, who had said that the BJP’s peak had not yet come and that it has to expand its footprint in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Telangana. Pradhan added that the recent bypoll results, in which BJP defeated TRS, indicated that the party is emerging as an alternative to the ruling party.

With the BJP facing a tough fight in Punjab, which is going to polls early next year, Nadda highlighted a host of government initiatives for the Sikh community. These include Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) clearance for funds meant for gurudwaras, exemption of langars from goods and services tax (GST) and opening the historic Kartarpur corridor for Sikh pilgrims. At the meeting, PM Modi was felicitated by Shah, Nadda, Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari, along with Piyush Goyal, for leading the party efficiently during the pandemic and the country achieving the one billion vaccination milestone.

The meeting, which is being held in hybrid mode – where state leaders are attending virtually – has already begun discussing the political resolution. The party had said that the discourse will focus on the upcoming by-elections in five states. Veteran party leaders LK Advani and MM Joshi joined the meeting virtually from their respective homes in the national capital.

Pradhan said of the 346 members in the national executive, the apex policy-making body of the BJP, 342 are attending the meeting and all of them had registered their names digitally.