A COUPLE OF days after she was made the National Democratic Alliance’s presidential candidate, Droupadi Murmu called Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren for support. She had been governor there from 2015 to 2021, and Soren had returned to power in 2019. The call put Soren in a quandary. A week prior, his Jharkhand Mukti Morcha had attended the opposition meeting that picked Yashwant Sinha to be Murmu’s opponent. Soren wished Murmu well, but was noncommittal.
Soren had become chief minister with the support of the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal, after the voters threw out the BJP for making Raghubar Das, a non-tribal, the chief minister.
But Soren’s seat is anything but safe. The BJP filed an office-for-profit petition against him, which the Election Commission and the High Court are currently hearing. Moreover, in June, the Enforcement Directorate arrested bureaucrat Pooja Singhal, known to be close to Soren, with unaccounted cash (over 036 crore) allegedly made from mining projects.
On June 27, within two days of Murmu’s call, Soren met Home Minister Amit Shah. A political crisis was brewing in Maharashtra, and Jharkhand was seen as the BJP’s next target. Soren apparently put forward some of his state’s demands in exchange for support to Murmu.
Two days later, Soren announced that he supported her candidacy, cutting another thread that held together a weak opposition unity.
Socioeconomic problems notwithstanding, the fissures in the opposition camp make the Narendra Modi government look potent ahead of the 15 assembly elections before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Of the opposition parties, Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party was the first to support Murmu. The Akali Dal soon followed suit. Both parties are facing an existential crisis, and want to side with the winners to remain relevant.
Sinha had banked on support from Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar—he has roots in the state and the they were colleagues in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee cabinet. But Kumar, though not on good terms with the BJP, does not forget past hurts. Sinha had opposed Kumar on a few occasions and had declared that he would float a new front to take him on during the last assembly elections.
In Karnataka, which goes to the polls in 2023, the Janata Dal (Secular) has been careful not to burn any bridges with the BJP. “They were proactive,” said a senior BJP leader. “They are seeing how the political situation is evolving across the country.”
The lack of unity in the opposition has led to calls for introspection. “The manner in which some of the Congress allies have chosen to support the NDA candidate should definitely serve as a warning sign for the homework to be done for the 2024 elections,” said Congress spokesperson Jaiveer Shergill. “The parties should think if their choices are free of the intimidating tactics of [investigating] agencies or will they cave in when it is convenient.”
The collapse of the Uddhav Thackeray government in Maharashtra seems to have had a big impact on the way parties interact with the BJP. With rebel Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde being made chief minister, the message was clear—the BJP is ready to honour regional aspirations and promote ambitions of those who are ready to switch sides.
Notably, the Thackeray-led Shiv Sena, which was part of the opposition grouping, was forced to support Murmu under pressure from its legislators.
Said BJP spokesperson Guru Prakash: “The opposition is completely disoriented. Apart from a lack of vision and a coherent strategy, they have displayed a sense of arrogance and a feudal mindset. When the history of social justice is written, parties like the RJD and the Congress will be on the wrong side.”
The BJP countered the Congress’s charge that the fear of investigating agencies could have influenced some parties. “Institutions have independence and act within their jurisdiction and under the rule of law,” said Prakash. “The opposition and the Congress have this mindset, because of which the Supreme Court had earlier called the CBI a caged parrot.”
As for the non-aligned parties, the Biju Janata Dal and the YSR Congress Party supported the NDA’s choice for president, as they had done last time.
By picking Murmu, Modi has not only sent a strong message to the country’s 10 crore-strong tribal community, but also given a peek into his politics. He wants to be seen as pro-poor when it comes to welfarism and election campaigns, even though his economic policy might be pro-business. Murmu’s inspirational story is likely to be hard sold as she occupies the highest office.
As for the vice presidential candidate, the NDA chose West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar, a Jat from a farming family. The politically active Jats hold sway in Haryana, Rajasthan, western Uttar Pradesh, pockets of Punjab and Delhi.
Within days of Dhankhar’s candidature, the Modi government also announced the setting up of a panel to decide on the minimum support price for crops, a key demand during the year-long farmers’ agitation.
Dhankhar is not a dyed-in-the-wool hindutva leader. He began his political career with the Janata Dal and was close to Jat leader Devi Lal. He became a Lok Sabha member, and then a minister in the V.P. Singh government. He later joined the Congress and became an MLA before switching to the BJP in 2003. As governor, Dhankhar took on the aggressive Mamata Banerjee and often waved the rule book at her government.
Incidentally, the presiding officers of both houses of Parliament could now be from Congress-ruled Rajasthan, which goes to the polls next year. If speaker Om Birla, a stickler for the rules, ran the Lok Sabha strictly, the BJP expects Dhankhar to do the same in the Rajya Sabha.
In picking Margaret Alva as its vice president candidate, the opposition has shown solidarity with the country’s minorities. Her candidacy might help the United Progressive Alliance during its campaign in south India, as the BJP’s candidates are from the east and the north. But, there is a long way to go. “The parties which otherwise are ideologically and politically opposed to the BJP,” said Shergill, “must rethink their strategy before we dive into 2024.”