Modi, a political figure who is widely seen as the face of BJP and a populist leader with a cult following, was expected to emerge victorious with the majority of seats to rule India. Largely seen as untouchable in his political support, he faced an immense disappointment in his most recent election. What led to this major upset in the election of one of the most prominent countries in the region?
Firstly, there is the internal attitude within the party workers. A lot of party members of the BJP were turncoats i.e migrants from other parties and these were usually very close to the election timeline. It is estimated that the rate at which BJP was taking candidates from other parties was one per day in the weeks closer to the elections. Prominent examples include Congress’s Gourav Vallabh, Vijender Singh, Ravneet Singh Bittu, Preneet Kaur, Arjun Modhwadia, and Naveen Jinal all joining the BJP in either March or April of 2024.
As a result, there was less enthusiasm within the party to advocate for an outsider. Thus there was less association of the voters with the person contesting the election and less campaigning for them as well. Additionally, the BJP fielded controversial and sometimes candidates with outright criminal cases. According to the Association for Democratic Reform, 36% (28 candidates) of all candidates fielded by the BJP had criminal cases. This makes it the party with the most criminal cases against it; Congress, however, is also quick to follow with 34% (19 candidates).
The outrage surrounding BJP candidates such as Prajwal Revanna turned out to be specific PR disaster with a scandal coming to light where almost 3000 videos of Revanna allegedly sexually assaulting multiple women began circulating. This was capitalised by the opposition party with prominent figures such as Rahul Gandhi calling Revanna “a mass rapist” and “The [prime minister] should know that all the women know that he protected Prajwal Revanna because he wanted the alliance and was greedy for power”.
Such led to the perception that BJP did not care about its women voters and hence alienated many. Other cases like that of Pragya Singh Thakur, who is known for her involvement in the 2008 Malegaon bombings case, and of Suresh Rana, who was involved in inciting the Muzaffarnagar riots, led to a general perception that BJP was not as morally pure of a party as they claimed to be.
Another part of morale was the perception across the board that the BJP would sweep the elections with the PM starting his electoral campaign with the slogan of “400 paar” which meant more than 400 seats in the elections. This was further strengthened by opinion polls by News 18 which predicted BJP to secure 411 seats, while India TV predicted it at 399 seats.
The Chandigarh election fraud happened in February 2024 where the returning officer was caught on CCTV attempting voter fraud by defacing ballot papers in favour of the BJP. This gained national attention with the Supreme Court regarding it as a “mockery of the purity of elections” and “a murder of democracy”. This was followed by the arrest of the Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and then the freezing of the bank accounts of the Congress. Whether these actions had legal standing or not, the timing clearly indicated political motives.
Many parties such as the Samajwadi Party also raised concerns of EVM malfunctions in areas such as UP. However, the Election Commission denied any such claims. All of this, increased the perception among the voter base that upon securing a third term which would have a majority in both houses, the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha, the ruling party would turn even more dictatorial in its approach and would infringe upon the civil liberties of the people.
A series of unpopular policies and administrative decisions were taken by the BJP that led to further alienation of moderates among their voter base and the electorate. These include the electoral bonds scam, the farmers protest, and the handling of the pandemic. The electoral bonds scam became a major point of criticism for the BJP which was accused of using it to further propagate a lack of transparency in political funding, disproportionately benefitting from this scheme, and giving favours and undue influence to companies that had given funding to the BJP under this scheme.
The opposition party called it “the world’s biggest scam”, framing it corrupt that favoured elites and major corporations, like Modi’s support for Adani. This alienated the general public of India who were plagued with rising unemployment and economic disparity. The unemployment rate rose from 4.9% to 6.57% during the two terms of BJP rule in India. Furthermore in 2014, the top 1% of the population owned 36.8% of the country’s wealth, whereas now they own 53%. The wealth of the top 10% increased from 65.9% of the total national wealth to 77% in 2024. All of this led to the BJP losing credibility in its ability to cater to the general public.
The farmers protested the government passing three agriculture laws with the stated goal of modernising agriculture in the country. However, the lack of economic security for the farmers because of the perception that these laws would inevitably lead to the removal of minimum support prices and market deregulation as well as a lack of legal protection since the disputes would be resolved by the Sub-Divisional Magistrates instead and not the traditional courts.
The narrative of the farmers being the backbone of the country is also particularly strong. Thus in villainizing a group that naturally has a lot of sympathy attached to it, the BJP gave further power to the opposition to use as propaganda against them. As a result, the BJP lost its domination of UP at the hands of opposition parties such as the Samajwadi Party and the Rashtriya Lok Dal.
In the 2019 elections, the BJP won 62 out of the 80 seats in UP and in this election, their seats dropped to 37. Furthermore, the BJP’s handling of the pandemic also left a lot to be desired among the voters. Due to the nationwide lockdown on 24th March 2020, with only a few hours notice to the people, many migrant workers were left stranded without any employment, food or way back to their homes and families.
Moreover, the BJP sent vaccines abroad before it had secured them for its own population and as a result was criticised for this strategy as well as the inadequate healthcare facilities leading to hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths during the pandemic. In Maharashtra, the BJP and its ally the Shiv Sena gained 41 seats in 2019, but with the Shiv Sena changing its position, the BJP only had 22 seats in the 2024 elections. In West Bengal, Mamta Banerjee’s TMC won 28 seats, whereas the BJP won 10 seats in 2024. Comparatively, the TMC had 22 and the BJP 18 seats in the 2014 elections.
In Manipur, violence had erupted among the Kuki-Zomi and the Meitei tribes when the Hindu majority Meitei demanded that scheduled tribe status be granted to them so that they can access reserved jobs and educational opportunities. This was opposed strongly as the feared that granting scheduled tribe status to the Meiteis would reduce the benefits for the existing scheduled tribes. It was largely ignored despite its severity until a video of two women from the Kuki-Zomi tribe being paraded naked in the streets of Manipur started circulating on social media. This strengthened the allegations that the government was favouring the Hindu Meitei community.
The Indian National Congress, on the other hand, heavily focused on the BJP government’s failure in Manipur in its electoral campaign and as a result was able to break the BJP’s hold of Manipur in these elections. The opposition leader, Rahul Gandhi, reframed his political image with the Bharat Jodo Yatra, becoming more involved in debates and press conferences, which contrasted to Modi’s absence from them and culminated in the proposition of a debate between the two which Modi was silent on and thus damaging his appeal as a prime ministerial candidate.
The sharp decline for BJP is also visible in the victory margin for the PMs who contested the seats in elections, that is, essentially the difference between the votes that the PM got and the votes that other candidates got in the constituency; Modi had the second lowest victory margin for any PM in Indian history in these elections, only winning by approximately 1.4 lac votes. This is a sharp drop from Modi’s 2019 third highest victory margin.
In comparison, other BJP leaders such as Shiv Raj Singh Chohan won with 8 lac votes in these elections. This shows how the loss of popularity of BJP rule in India is represented in the dented popularity of Narendra Modi himself. He is no longer as popular of a figure within the BJP and his loss in support is indicative of the loss of support of his policies.
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Mr Yasir Rashid is currently pursuing his A levels in Politics, Sociology and History, among other subjects.