SSB Lecturette Series: An Election of Ideologies

The Bihar election have finally concluded and the results are out. The BJP along with its allies has been beaten in the election by the so called old-school politicians Nitish and Lalu. The BJP despite putting in full force have again got the same result as the Delhi elections. The results not only shocked the BJP but the winning Grand Alliance as well, as they did not think that they would enjoy such a majority in this election.

The Grand Alliance formed with the regional parties which includes Nitish's JD(U), Lalu Prasad's RJD and the Congress. Even the Aam Aadmi Party supported the grand alliance in order to attract the voters. The election was a litmus test for the Modi Juggernaut which started in the Lok Sabha elections of 2014. The BJP on one side backed the same formula of making the PM as their chief campaigner while the Grand Alliance played a master stroke by announcing Nitish Kumar as Bihar's Chief ministerial candidate.

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The Bihar Campaign:

After the defeat in the Delhi elections the BJP was desperate to get a good result in Bihar. Moreover, the cold war between Prime Minister Modi and Bihar CM Nitish Kumar was to be won by BJP at any cost. Hence, this election held all the more importance to the BJP cadre. even before the real campaign started the BJP started giving hints to the people of Bihar as to what was coming next. It firstly started with the statement made by Amit Shah regarding Modi that he was the first OBC Prime Minister of the country which in real was a false fact as the first OBC Prime Minister of the country was H.D. Deve Gowda. Moreover, it was being again and again reminded to the people that Prime minister was from a poor background and was a son of a Tea seller.

When the campaign started the PM Modi termed that, with the coming of Grand Alliance in Bihar, Bihar would go back to 'Jungle Raj'. He also iterated that betraying friends and allies was in Nitish's 'DNA'. Nitish turned it into an insult to the 'Bihari asmita(pride)' and asked BJP workers to collect DNA samples (hairs, nails) and send it to the PMO. In another statement by the RSS head Mohan Bhagwat saying that the Central government is planning to scrap all reservation from the government sector jobs was a huge loss to the BJP. Moreover, Lalu Prasad yadav latched on the statement and spread the same in whole of Bihar. To counter this BJP said that the Grand Alliance was planning to have a separate quota for Muslims which will reduce quota for other castes. But this was cleared by the GA in their sabha's.

Later on, Nitish also called Modi as a 'Bahari' or an outsider. But to this Modi responded that how a Prime Minister of a country for whom even the people of Bihar have voted would be an outsider. he also asked that if he is an outsider then what is Sonia Gandhi? Moreover, the case of Dadri lynching case made things worse for the image of BJP. 

Also, the silence of Prime Minister over the case for almost 10 days and vague statements by the various ministers of the BJP also contributed to the loss in value of the BJP. Also towards the end of the election the prices of pulses touched sky and were more than a kilo of chicken, to which the BJP had no answer. Also, they tried to divert the minds of people by showing old videos of Nitish Kumar meeting a Tantric. To which Nitish and Lau hit back by showing old photos of Modi with an astrologer as well as Asaram. BJP also published an advertisement of people loving the cow and asking to vote against the cow slaughterers.

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'Bhramastra' in Nitish's Quiver:

Election may seem to be a process of a fight between two candidates but a lot of strategy and workforce is put behind an election in order to make a party win the hearts of the people. Hence, Nitish hired a company to prepare the strategy for this election. The company was the same which was responsible for the mandate of the 2014 Lok Sabha election and is named as Indian People's Action Committee (IPAC) headed by Strategist Prashant Kishor.

They closely associated with Bihar and sketched out a proper strategy to win the election. When Modi announced the package for Bihar, posters came up in Bihar urging people not to fall for the "eyewash" and vote for Nitish Kumar. Moreover, they distributed 30 cycles to the dedicated workers in each constituency who went to 50 houses each day. In the next 10 days, these workers went to 15000 houses handling personal letters and playing out speech of Nitish kumar over phone. This was the Ghar Ghar dastak outreach campaign. They also collected DNA samples from various peole in order to send to PMO and stoke the Bihari pride.

Earlier Lalu and Nitish planned to do joint rallies, but Kishor convinced them to do the rallies separately and cover more ground. Moreover, every time Modi would make a claim Nitish would counter it by the research done by Kishor and his team. Moreover, Kishor flooded the roads with Nitish's posters in Muzaffarpur rallies of Modi. Moreover, when PM as set to head a rally in Patna, Nitish fired few questions over twitter to Modi and Modi started his speech by criticising the tweets which was a trap set by them to deviate Modi from the real topic. Hence, overall some smart moves by Kishor and his company lead to an effective campaign for the Grand alliance.

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Conclusion:

The election in Bihar started with 'Development' as its core issue. But with the passage of time other factors took over and caste, religion and cow became the centre point of the whole election. The question is not that which party was overall more secular in the whole process, but the bigger questions is why the issue of development goes to backstage when the election gets intense. Moreover,  the electoral process should be about uniting the people rather than diving them on the basis of their faith. Also, it should be more about the policies which each party is going to implement once they come into power. Hence, the Election commission must set guidelines as to how an election campaign must go forward and must see if they are being followed because in the process of winning an election we cannot lose the nation.

About the Author:  Pranav Nikam is an Electrical and Electronics engineer who is working in a renowned MNC in Chennai. He likes to work out in gym, do photography and play badminton. Through his articles he wants to spread awareness among other defence aspirants.