Anxiety is writ large on the faces of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) bigwigs as the dragging on of the war in West Asia and devastating blows suffered by Israel have taken the steam out of its election campaign in four states and one Union Territory, which go to poll between April 9 and 29.
As the saffron party is just a paper tiger in four out of five assemblies (barring Assam), the lingering of conflict for so long, thousands of kilometres away, has deprived it of excessive media space which it used to enjoy in all such exercises since 2014. At the same time, the BJP’s electioneering is struggling to pick up momentum as the entire scenario has changed completely after February 28’s bid to bring about regime change in Iran.
Notwithstanding efforts, the party is finding it difficult to polarise the society in the same scale as in the earlier elections, especially in West Bengal, which goes to poll on April 23 and 29 and Assam on April 9. It is unable to make Bangladeshi “infiltrators” a big issue as it used to do till February last.
Return of natives
The war has brought about a quota of woes, as lakhs of Indians have silently started migrating to their native places from the Gulf countries, Israel and even within India. The fear of job loss as well as the slowing down of the economy have started haunting the Narendra Modi government. The oil and gas crises, coupled with a rise in prices and fear of shortages and hoarding of essential items, have brought about uncertainty across the country.
At this point in time, when India decided to come to the rescue of Bangladesh by pumping 5,000 metric ton of diesel to Dhaka from its refinery in Assam, it would be a challenging task to whip up anti-Tarique Rahman government hysteria to politically cash in on the election in these two eastern states.
Unlike the 2021 Assembly election campaign, there is absolutely no scope to make a political pilgrimage to Bangladesh, where Modi visited on March 26-27, just on the eve of the first phase of the West Bengal poll on March 27.
Apparently, he was there on the invitation of the then Hasina government to attend the 50th anniversary of the start of the Liberation War in 1971, but the Indian Prime Minister used the occasion to address the Matuas in their spiritual headquarters in Bangladesh, where he paid glowing tributes to its founder, Sri Sri Harichand Thakur, on March 27.
As Matuas, a Scheduled Caste, have a substantial population in West Bengal too, the move was hailed as a master stroke. But the stunning victory of the Trinamool Congress, which won 215 out of 294 seats, suggests that his trip did not work.
In Kerala, which is among the highest exporters of expatriates, the BJP is finding it really difficult to address their predicament as families back home are worried over the deteriorating situation in the Gulf.
They are getting little assurance from the Union government on this count.
Pre-war situation
But before “good friends” Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu bungled, Prime Minister Modi undertook a visit to Malaysia on February 7-8, from where he addressed the Tamil diasporas. Whether such speeches would bring about Tamil Nadu voters to the booth to vote for the BJP or not is not an issue here; what is crucial is the timing of the gathering in Kuala Lumpur – exactly two months before the Tamil Nadu election.
Similarly, he flew to Jerusalem (February 25 and 26) less for any significant trade or arms deal with Israel but more to do with the Assembly elections back home in India. The trip was designed to show to the Hindutva brigade back home that he stands firm in favour of a Zionist state – though till a few decades back, the Sangh Parivar was the greatest champion of Adolf Hitler, whose army is accused of massacring 60 lakh Jews.
It is a general perception that an anti-Muslim jingoistic line suits the BJP in the election. It is another thing that the whole exercise has backfired and the saffron brigade is now unable to explain the timing of the sudden outpouring of love for the “fatherland” aka Israel.
Exaggerated projection
The Iranian counter-attack has exposed how fragile and weak Israel actually is. The Western public opinion makers have sketched a larger-than-life image of the Zionist state, when the fact is that, alone, that is without the help of the US and European powers, it can never fight and defeat any non-state actor in the region, let alone Iran.
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, between 2020 and 2024, Israel imported 66 per cent of its arms from the United States, 33 per cent from Germany and 0.9 per cent from Italy. As it is in all practical purposes the 51st state of the US, almost the entire war machine manufactured there has the stamp of America – they are built with the collaboration of its technology. Billions of dollars are pumped into the Israeli defence sector by the West annually.
Thus, a fake narrative is spread that Israel is the eighth largest exporter of arms in the world, when the fact is totally contrary to this claim.
So, instead of buying from Israel, weapons can easily be bought from Washington. But since the West wants to project Israel as a separate identity and not as a 51st state of the US, several Third World countries are willingly falling into this trap.
Now that the Iron Domes are melting away like wax and THAADs have fallen with a loud thud, destroyed by Iran, it has become extremely difficult for the BJP star campaigners to boast in the election rallies that they have bought so many impregnable weapon systems from Israel to defend the “Motherland.”
As Donald Trump has let down and humiliated India on tariffs, Operation Sindoor and the purchase of Russian oil, and Benjamin Netanyahu has been badly beaten and bruised on the battlefield, there is little scope to market the nationalistic slogans during the electioneering. Thus, there is a lack of enthusiasm in the battle cry of the saffron camp.
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