 "PM Modi")
A day after the election results to four states, dissonance within the INDIA bloc of parties became apparent with several allies — from West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to her Kerala counterpart Pinarayi Vijayan, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Janata Dal (United) — blaming the Congress for its failure to accommodate allies.
Banerjee said she would skip Wednesday’s meeting of the Opposition alliance while Vijayan blamed the Congress’ losses on its “greed and lust for power”. Janata Dal (United) leaders said the alliance needed a credible face to lead it, such as Bihar CM Nitish Kumar. They slammed the Congress for not inviting Banerjee, Kumar and others to campaign in the Hindi heartland.
The Congress leadership took solace in its win in Telangana, where party President Mallikarjun Kharge has been entrusted to take a call on the state’s next chief minister even as A Revanth Reddy is the frontrunner. It pointed out its vote share in the three Hindi heartland states had not dropped in the 2023 elections when compared with its 2018 performance when it had won all three starts.
In contrast, an upbeat BJP leadership, including Union Home Minister Amit Shah and party chief J P Nadda, met while the party’s state in-charges and leaders from Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan also called on them.
However, uncertainty persisted over the names of the chief ministers of the three Hindi heartland states that the BJP has won.
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If at least 25 legislators called on former Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje at her residence in Jaipur to show their support for her, Madhya Pradesh legislator Kailash Vijayvargiya, a contender for the post of chief minister in Madhya Pradesh, met the party leadership in the national capital. Vijayvargiya, and other party leaders, credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi and not Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s ‘Ladli Behna scheme for the party’s win.
“Was the Ladli Behna scheme there in Chhattisgarh or Rajasthan,” Vijayvargiya, who won from Indore, had said on Saturday. There is speculation that the BJP leadership could look beyond Raje and Raman Singh in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, respectively, but might find it difficult to ignore Chouhan’s claim in MP. However, the names of several leaders from these states were part of the buzz as possible contenders.
On the first day of Parliament, BJP members greeted the Prime Minister with slogans of “teesri baar Modi sarkar” as he entered the Lok Sabha. Addressing the media before the session began, the PM asked the Opposition not to vent its frustration over the Assembly polls defeat inside Parliament and move forward, leaving behind “negativity”.
Among the contestants, if losers rued their fate, some of the winners, such as the BJP’s Balmukund Acharya, elected from the Hawa Mahal seat in Jaipur, were up and about. On Monday, a video appeared online, showing Balmukund, fresh from his victory, is purportedly giving directions to an official on the phone to remove roadside shops selling non-vegetarian food at the Chandi Ki Taksal area in his constituency.
Former IAS officer O P Chaudhary, being seen as a contender to be the next Chhattisgarh chief minister, found it wise to nip speculation in the bud, tweeting he was in Raipur and not leaving for New Delhi, “contrary to the rumours being spread by some”.
In the Opposition camp, Banerjee said she would have rescheduled her itinerary to attend Wednesday’s meeting Kharge had called if she had been informed earlier. Her nephew and party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee also criticised the Congress.
An AAP leader said that the results of the three states showed there was significant anti-Congress sentiment in North India, and that it should not blame smaller parties for cutting into its vote share. On Sunday, AAP’s Jasmine Shah had said how his was the bigger party in northern India as it ran two governments to the Congress’ one while some pointed out that it received fewer votes than NOTA (none of the above) in the recently concluded elections.
Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati, whose party is not a constituent of either of the two leading alliances, expressed surprise at the results in the Hindi heartland states.
