Lok Sabha election results 2024 – A common man’s stance

The politically happening nation of the world just announced It’s Lok Sabha election results that will shape the next five years of the country. The last 10 years have been eventful for India, with the BJP emerging into the spotlight almost uncontested and enjoying unprecedented popularity on a national and international scale. Unless you have been living under a rock, you know that a man named Narendra Modi hailing from modest backgrounds in Gujarat made history in the political scenario in India.

After a decade of having almost no challenge from any of the opposition parties, BJP confidently contested for its third term only to be humbled with what can be called a wake-up call from the country’s voters. A couple of wake-up calls have been delivered to the party in the past during the state elections, but the BJP apparently did not learn the lesson. There have been a number of reformative activities in the Last 10 years combined with a handful of religious victories that had evidently given the party an illusion of invincibility. With the results of the 2024 Lok Saba elections, the facade has come crashing down and a harsh reality check has been delivered to the elite members of the BJP that their fortress is very breachable. The overconfidence that even an alliance of almost all the opposition parties cannot beat a single party has been quite expensive for the BJP.

Everyone including the opponents were prepared for this to be an easy victory for the BJP, in context of the Ram Mandir spectacle put up in January 2024. The entire opposition had a problem with the spectacle because they assumed that it is leading the party to an easy victory in the upcoming elections. A surprise has been delivered as the BJP lost its seat from what was assumed to be the very heartland of its power. The citizens of Ayodhya where the grand Ram Mandir was established after 400 years of wait did not vote for the BJP. This is subject to a lot of interpretation but the primary takeaway is that religious Hindu votes, which were assumed to be BJP’s stronghold, are clearly not.

An unimpressive majority of 292 seats for the NDA is still keeping the BJP government in power. The country calls it unimpressive because It’s not on par with the party’s previous achievements. The fact that it is still a great deal better than it’s arch rival’s 99 seats and the alliance’s <240 seats is an understated fact. The BJP has become that class topper who is evaluated on her own league because the competition is not even close. And when she doesn’t meet her own standards, the below average performer rejoices. There was even an official image released on the INC Twitter handle showcasing its topmost level of leaders posing with the victory sign- over what, they alone know.

Anyways; the core voter base has been the BJP’s saviour this Lok Sabha elections. No amount of appeasement politics has won the BJP any favour in any state. The core voter base that has associated the party with higher purposes such as the greater good of the nation or welfare for the majority has stayed with the party because of the idealistic notions that it associates with the party more than realistic benefits that it has reaped from it. It hopes that atleast now that the value of the core voters has been realised by the party, it will step up to cater to their needs. The patience level wears thin and no one is to say when it will run out. As this elections have proved, the BJP does not have an unquestioning loyal voter base like a certain community that stands with the INC no matter what. The BJP will have to perform.

There are not many complaints about the developmental activities undertaken by the BJP government in the last 10 years. Everyone is happy with the roads and the airports. However, there are a great deal of complaints about the financial- especially taxation aspects that have negatively affected the middle class. While this could have been one of the major reasons why the BJP lost a great deal of votes this year; there remains a lot of introspection yet to be made about what happened to the Hindu voter base that was expected to stay with the party, especially in constituencies like Ayodhya because the party is accused time and again of being partial towards Hindus. The only substantial promise made by the opposition alliance was that of freebie schemes. While this promise has worked exceptionally well in state elections such as Delhi and Karnataka, it was not expected to work at all on a national level. It remains to be seen what part of the votes Went towards Freebie schemes, and where all other votes were lost. It is also considerable that the voter turnout after phase six was 63.37% – there could have been a good chunk of votes that were not cast at all.

All said and done, The NDA Alliance is back in the Parliament for its third tenure as the ruling government, but the BJP is kept on its toes by supporters like Nitish Kumar and Chandrababu Naidu. I’d say the humbling was due. A massive priority shift is on the cards for the BJP in the third tenure. It is simply true that the campaigning for the elections was lazy and overconfident. While the opposing alliance likes to think that the downfall of the BJP has begun and silly YouTubers have been making this kind of impact on the election results, the truth lies in the simple fact that the BJP has not met its own standards. I truly hope that the third tenure is redefining for the party as well as the country.