BJP's Biggest Mistakes In Uttar Pradesh In The 2024 Lok Sabha Election

This is a translated and edited excerpt from a longer conversation on the What This Means podcast with Amit Yadav, about the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) election review meet in Uttar Pradesh. To listen to the full episode on Spotify, click here, and for the app, click here.

Three major reasons for the BJP's losses in Uttar Pradesh (UP):

1. Poor ticket distribution

The BJP repeated many of its previous candidates. The minimal changes made too were quite bad.

For example, in seats like Ghaziabad, Meerut, and Gautam Buddh Nagar, the party usually fields one candidate each from the Brahmin, Baniya, and Rajput communities.

However, this time, two of those three seats were given to Baniya candidates, creating an anti-Rajput atmosphere that persisted until the last phase of the election.

Similarly, on other seats, the party ignored regional dynamics and public discontent with incumbent candidates.

In regions like Devipatan, Ayodhya, and Basti, which are Kurmi-dominant, the BJP did not field a single Kurmi candidate. This fuelled an anti-Kurmi narrative that affected even Prime Minister Narendra Modi's seat, a Kurmi-dominant Vidhan Sabha seat, resulting in a lower winning margin compared to the previous Lok Sabha elections.

2. Sangathan's absence on the ground and central control

If the BJP's central leadership had given the state government a free hand to build a team and work hard, we might have seen a different result today.

Of course, if they had failed to deliver outcomes, the central leadership could then have stepped in and taken action against them.

However, the truth is that all major decisions regarding the UP Lok Sabha election were under the control of the central leadership.

Furthermore, the induction of leaders from other parties into the BJP weren't well-received. In 2017, it was understandable to give positions and power to leaders coming in from outside the BJP. But, in 2022, there was no need for it.

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath enjoys immense popularity in the state, and people were voting for him and his governance. And they did, resulting in the BJP's massive victory in the state.

However, many outside leaders were not only inducted into the party but also given important positions in the government.

For example, Jitin Prasada was given the Public Works Department within a year of induction and O P Rajbhar was given the Panchayati Raj Ministry. Both these ministries are significant.

A leader like Dara Singh Chauhan, who created an anti-BJP and anti-Other Backward Class (OBC) narrative and went on to join the Samajwadi Party, was been welcomed back into the BJP, and also lost his seat during the assembly bypolls.

We saw the party organisation openly blaming the state government and bureaucracy for the party's poor performance. But this blame game is because the sangathan did not put in the hard work, and now they just want to save face and continue holding their powerful positions.

The primary reason for the BJP's loss was the attitude of the party organisation. No meetings with the public were held on the ground by them.

Additionally, many leaders in the organisation who were appointed by the party's central leadership have direct access to the high command in Delhi, and hence they have no accountability and responsibility to the state leadership and government.

This conveys to other leaders within the organisation that the state leadership has limited influence over decisions, leading them to perceive the state leadership as powerless.

3. High dependency on the Modi-Yogi factor for votes

The BJP believed they could win the election in UP based solely on the Modi-Yogi appeal. Hence, they made the following mistakes:

– They did not change candidates to address anti-incumbency.

– The party organisation did not work hard on the ground.

– The party failed to counter the anti-reservation and anti-Constitution narratives spread by the opposition.

The overconfidence of the party organisation and their overdependence on the Modi-Yogi appeal cost the BJP dearly.

A national election, which people saw as electing Narendra Modi as their prime minister, ended up becoming an election where people voted to elect local candidates to power.