Modi finds his narrative, Opposition at a loss

Without giving an opportunity to the BJP to question their "nationalist" credentials, the Opposition needs to bring back the political agenda to farmers, unemployment and crisis of small businesses

Coming virtually on the eve of the impending general elections, the pre-emptive air strikes against terrorist proxies used by Pakistan have hit the Opposition hard. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has regained public approval.

The Opposition will find it difficult to counter his narrative of not only punishing Pakistan for sponsoring terrorism against India but bringing back the Indian fighter pilot captured by Pakistan within 48-hours. This will be spun out into a major campaign with two heroes at the centre of the story – Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman. The latter’s story will only support the heroic deeds of the former. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will get brand rub-off from both in the polls.

The political party that is most likely to suffer because of the changing public mood is the Congress. After its electoral victory in the three Hindi-belt states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, the party had become arrogant suggesting that it could make a comeback on its own. Now it will be forced to get off its high horse.

After the pre-emptive air strikes the ground situation has changed in North Indian states where the BJP was most worried about its electoral performance. Only in Punjab, Congress Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh, himself a retired military man, may be able to hold his flock together by vociferously supporting the military action against Pakistan. Public sentiment has swung in the other states which send a large numbers of men to the armed forces – especially Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Haryana – providing a fillip to the BJP’s electoral fortunes.

Except for Bihar, the Opposition parties in these states are in a disarray. Even in Uttar Pradesh, which will decide the future of the Modi government with its 80 Lok Sabha seats, the outcome may be better for the BJP than was being predicted a few weeks ago. Barring Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Bihar, the Congress has been unable to form alliances with Opposition parties elsewhere notably in Andhra, West Bengal, Delhi and Haryana. Its failure to cooperate with Opposition parties, big or small, suggests that the grand old party had failed up to now to identify its primary enemy.

The post-Pulwama scenario, however, seems to have compelled the Congress to rethink its approach. Despite contrary advice from his short-sighted lieutenants in Delhi, Congress president Rahul Gandhi has apparently decided to explore an electoral alliance with the Aam Adami Party. There is also an attempt to explore a possible alliance with the Trinamul Congress in West Bengal, the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party in Uttar Pradesh and the Telugu Desam Party in Andhra Pradesh.

There is speculation that Priyanka Gandhi will call on BSP Supremo Mayawati in the coming days, although just that may not be sufficient to bring her around. She may need persuading by other Opposition leaders as well to subordinate her interests to the larger goal of defeating the BJP.

The theme of muscular nationalism will have a pan-India impact. Thus, while the whole nation was celebrating Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman as a brave Indian pilot, Prime Minister Modi made it a point of describing him as a Tamil in his speech inaugurating the rail link from Rameshwaram to Dhanushkodi in Tamil Nadu.

Tamil Nadu Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam has claimed that the prime minister had taken “Narasimha Avataar (The Man-lion incarnation of Lord Vishnu)” to slay the terrorists in Pakistan. This time round, the BJP hopes to add to its current tally of one Lok Sabha seat in an alliance with the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK). Although the BJP’s stakes are not very high in the South Indian states, the nationalist narrative may help it make some gains there too.

Even though the Opposition parties initially presented a united front with the government on the pre-emptive strike, they have begun to realise that Prime Minster Modi and his party will be the primary beneficiaries of the nationalist sentiment being whipped up. Without giving an opportunity to the BJP to question their “nationalist” credentials, they need to bring back the political agenda to farmers, unemployment, crisis of small businesses and the social fractures created by the BJP government. Instead of trying to own the jingoistic rhetoric, it might be better for them to highlight the narcissism of a prime minister who claims that any attack on him is an attack on the nation.

Speaking at a public rally in Vishakahapatnam the prime minister played up his ‘muscular’ policies and accused the Opposition of weakening India by offering the people a ‘majboor’ (weak and helpless) government as an alternative to his “majboor” or strong government. For good measure he added that it was because of the weak governments in the past that Pakistan had dared behave as it did with India.

Seeing which way the wind was blowing following the Pulwama terrorist strike, fractious allies such as with the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra and the Akali Dal in Punjab have swiftly sewn up alliances with the BJP. The Prime Minister has also tried to refurbish his image as a pro-Dalit leader through a photo op where he washed the feet of Dalit men and women. The first installment of Rs 2000 direct bank debit to one crore farmers under the PM-Kisan scheme has already been paid out and a second installment is likely to be released soon.

With Prime Minister Modi using every arrow in his quiver to ensure his re-election, the Opposition as of now does not seem to have a counter narrative nor a focused approach to defeat the BJP.

If Prime Minister Modi is re-elected, having learnt from his mistakes, he will be surer in acting against the Opposition party leaders than he was in his first term. This realisation alone should be sufficient to push them to shed their egos and unite against the BJP. Even now, poll arithmetic has the potential to defeat Modi’s new-found chemistry with the electorate.

The writer is a journalist based in Delhi. He tweets @bharatitis