Report card: BJP's campaign mantra for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections

The party campaigning over the past 10 years has been themed around Brand Modi. But the messaging has changed. Nivedita Mookerji explains

Taglines ranging from “Abki Baar Modi Sarkar” to “Phir Ek Baar Modi Sarkar” capture the 10-year journey of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) with Theme Modi at the centre of it all. Against that backdrop, political watchers, analysts, and party insiders interpret the BJP’s standout messaging in the 2024 election campaign and how it compares with the previous two Lok Sabha polls in 2014 and 2019.
 

A BJP insider, who did not want to be named, described the party’s 2014 campaign as aggressive and combative. It showcased what’s possible riding on the Gujarat model of performance at a time when policy paralysis under the UPA (United Progressive Alliance) government was a talking point. Back then, the message that was put forward was this: “What Gujarat had done and India could not do....’’ 
 

When the BJP went into the 2019 polls, it had lost many states and the impact of the demonetisation exercise of 2016 could still be felt. “Then Pulwama and Balakot happened ...,” the person quoted above said, explaining the factors that helped the BJP in 2019. He pointed out that in 2024, it’s all about visible and tangible transformation, as against claims. “This election will be based on a report card of great delivery by the party,’’ he summed up.

Despite the confidence about delivery and growth, the BJP’s election strategy rests on taking up the contest in all seriousness. In a recent interaction in New Delhi, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who’s also a prominent BJP spokesperson, told Business Standard that “every election is a contest that the BJP performs to its fullest, contest is always taken up in all seriousness.’’ While pointing out that no election is easy and there’s no such thing as a soft fight in the election season, Sitharaman gave a ringside view comparing 2024 polls with the previous two.
 

“2014 was a transitional election — moving out of a regime to a regime that was giving development its highest priority. Also, the prime contestant was a chief minister who had a record of high performance in Gujarat and now he was pitching for the nation,’’ Sitharaman said. 2019 was a different context but the effort of BJP workers and the entire party was as much, if not more, as it was in 2014, she said. “In 2019, I won’t say there was a tailwind but there was this desire to keep the momentum going....’’ 
 

Sitharaman termed the 2024 election campaign as very unique in that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set a target publically — 370 seats for the BJP and 400 for the National Democratic Alliance. “That has already set a pitch for us to perform again. The tailwind this time is 10 years of delivery. Everything that was promised has been delivered with the common man at the centre of it all...,’’ she said. 
 

According to Sitharaman, the momentum and the intensity of the work remain as much, if not more.
 

Although the BJP as a party is yet to roll out its election-linked advertisements, the narrative in the government and public sector publicity so far has been on Brand Modi, whether it’s “Modi ki Guarantee”, “Tabhi Toh Sab Modi ko Chunte Hai”, “Chharso Paar” or “Phir Ek Baar Modi Ki Sarkar”. Samit Sinha, founder and managing partner at Alchemist Brand Consulting, said reading between the lines of these messages suggests supreme confidence, almost as if who ultimate winner of the elections is a foregone conclusion and the rest is just a matter of details. “To me, that is the standout feature of the 2024 BJP campaign,’’ Sinha said.
 

In an email reply to the query on the 2024 campaign as against the earlier two, Milan Vaishnav, director and senior fellow, South Asia Program Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said: “Clearly, the BJP has raised its sights from notching a clear majority to ‘Mission 400’ for its NDA alliance.’’ For Vaishnav, one of the most remarkable features of the early election campaigning is “the way in which the BJP has stitched together a formidable alliance after a period which saw ally after ally leave its stable”. As for the Opposition INDIA bloc, he said: “I think we are seeing a repeat of 2019 in that the best-laid plans for Opposition unity have not fructified in key states.’’  
 

While the BJP did not comment on its advertisements ahead of the polls, a senior party functionary said the leaders being sent out for campaigning would talk about the leadership of the PM, delivery on several fronts over 10 years, India as a bright spot globally and the focus on youth, women, farmers and the middle class.
 

Amid all the campaign rush in heat and dust, artificial intelligence could give some competition to politicians in 2024 elections that could cost as much as $14.4 billion, around double of the election spend in 2019, going by the estimates of the Centre for Media Studies. As Vaishnav pointed out, “In terms of campaigning, we are likely to see a greater use of AI and possibly, deepfakes.”