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BJP looks to revamp party, finalise electoral strategy before key polls
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to address a meeting of the council of ministers on July 3.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is putting the finishing touches to a plan that it will launch in July to strengthen the party organisation, which could see some cabinet ministers in the government moving to organisational posts (a change that would necessitate a cabinet reshuffle), and to finalise its campaign strategy and refine its candidate selection process ahead of the five state elections later this year and the national elections next year.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to address a meeting of the council of ministers on July 3.
According to a party functionary who asked not to be named, three big meetings between the central leadership of the BJP and state-level functionaries have been scheduled for July 6, 7 and 8, where changes in the organisation at the central level and the state will be decided. This person added that meetings between the party brass – BJP president JP Nadda, Union home minister Amit Shah, national general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh – and state leaders that took place in the national capital over the past one month were a precursor to these.
“These meetings will be crucial for (finalising) organisational changes, assessing the performance of lawmakers, legislators and party functionaries for the process of candidate selection and identifying state-specific issues on which the campaign will be mounted,” the functionary said.
A clutch of states will be clubbed together at the meetings, spread over three days for logistical purposes, said the functionary. “For instance, leaders from states in the northern region such as Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Delhi, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh will meet in Delhi on July 7. A day earlier, the meeting will be in Assam of the states in the east and north-east. On July 8, leaders of the southern and western regions will meet in Hyderabad.”
There have been complaints from the cadre about leadership crisis, intra-party fractures and the fatigue factor related to some leaders, and along with these, demands to effect changes in the state units ahead of elections in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Mizoram and Telangana later this year, a second functionary said. “Similar demands have also come from others states as well. But these changes are not only based on complaints; ahead of elections, the party leadership normally rotates people around. Sometimes those in government (ministers) are brought back to the party fold and others are deputed in their place,” added this person who asked not to be named.
There has been speculation that some of the ministers who are members of the Rajya Sabha could be given tickets to contest elections, while some others may be drafted for election-related work. These ministers will be replaced by leaders from the states, representing different castes and to balance regional aspirations.
“The BJP is the only party that has politically empowered the economically and socially backward castes. In the last reshuffle that took place in (July) 2021, 27 OBCs were inducted, while 12 were from Scheduled Castes, 11 women and 8 from the Scheduled Tribes,” said the second functionary.
Hyperlocal issues in each of the states, from finding the right candidates, to picking issues that resonate on the ground will be examined at the meetings. “For instance, in Madhya Pradesh, anti- incumbency and the fatigue factor is a major issue. In Telangana, while the party has a strong base and leaders in Hyderabad, Mehboobnagar and the northern parts, there is a leadership crisis in the rest of the state,” said the second functionary. While the BJP is hoping to benefit from the schism in the Congress camp in Rajasthan, a reunited party unit in Chhattisgarh has added to its woes in the state where it is facing a leadership crisis.
“PM Modi is the crowd puller and the face of all elections, but the experience from the past elections shows we need strong chief ministerial candidates as well. This issue is particularly important in Rajasthan and MP where the CM candidate is key to electioneering,” this person added.
The functionaries said the party will focus on state specific campaigns and on building a strong local leadership to counter the opposition parties that are coalescing to take on the BJP in 2024. The party’s social engineering formula that seeks to bring together diverse caste groups, its social welfare schemes, and development pitch are being fine-tuned to counter the opposition’s election promises. “The electoral loss that the party faced in Himachal and Karnataka, largely attributed to the popularity of the Congress’s guarantees that promised free units of power, cash incentives, and other freebies has nudged the party to revisit its strategy of dubbing welfare measures as freebies,” said a third leader.
Feedback from the ground being an integral part of the election strategy, the party has also deployed 2600 vistaraks (part timers) to spend a week in 2600 mandals across the five-poll bound states from July 1. A discussion on the BJP’s ties with the allies will also be part of the meetings.
