The Bharatiya Janata Party is going to spend the next few days in a made-for-television drama cycle.
First a few speak out against the leadership, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah, and blame them for the BJP's loss in Bihar's state elections. In response, the "collective responsibility" argument is brought up (i.e it's not Modi/Shah's fault). Then the dissenters will start to be attacked directly (when have they been so successful at winning elections anyway). Others still will continue to speak out against the leadership. Slowly, in the run-up to next year's election for the party president post, it will start to become clear who falls into which camp.
In the process of all this high-profile politicking, the party might not have the time or freedom to properly examine what went so massively wrong in Bihar, a state where as recently as September the BJP seemed to be leading. Its immediate response to the loss made sense and yet seemed willfully simplistic: It is all just caste arithmetic.
Under the scalpel
Others outside the party apparatus have, meanwhile, begun dissecting the results in earnest.
Commentary from the liberal set has mostly been predictable: It is a victory for anti-communal forces, a rejection of beef politics and a vote in favour of plurality – which 2014 was not. This tends to be followed up either with an exhortation for Modi to refocus on economics or triumphalism about the potential march of a national anti-Modi movement.
But it is the analysis of those who have been Modi supporters in the past that is the most interesting. Few are accepting the caste arithmetic argument. Instead, most of this commentary has come to a simple conclusion: Modi and the BJP have lost sight of what made them successful in 2014. And that means 2019 is in danger.
Sympathetic opinions
In fact, many explicitly say this. A sampling of comments from those who have supported the prime minister in the past:
*Ashok Malik in the Economic Times calls for a re-focus on economic policymaking and halting the "over-projection" of Modi as a vote winner: "Frankly, if Modi wants a second term, he has to act now as if the current term is his final term."
*Minhaz Merchant for DailyO writes that the party needs to learn to be inclusive not just with electoral communities but also with allies. "If the BJP cannot even counter him when Lalu launches his national anti-Modi campaign from Varanasi, it does not deserve to govern India after 2019."
*V Anantha Nageshwaran in Mint says that the BJP has failed to study either its failure or its successes well enough: "The baseline scenario has to be one of this government muddling through until 2019, when the country’s perdition resumes."
*Kanchan Gupta in ABP blames poor expectation management and Modi's government dragging its heels on the investment cycle: "Therein lies the reason why Modi Sarkar is now being seen, even by its ardent supporters, as dangerously close to running the risk of losing the plot. "
*Surajit Dasgupta in Swarajya writes that the government has simply been a "better Congress," and needs to attempt real reform: "If Modi draws that same, tired conclusion from the Bihar verdict, increasing the ambit of the state in the nation’s economy, it is end of achchhey din for Bharat. And then, in 2019, he will meet the fate Rao met with in 1996."
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First a few speak out against the leadership, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah, and blame them for the BJP's loss in Bihar's state elections. In response, the "collective responsibility" argument is brought up (i.e it's not Modi/Shah's fault). Then the dissenters will start to be attacked directly (when have they been so successful at winning elections anyway). Others still will continue to speak out against the leadership. Slowly, in the run-up to next year's election for the party president post, it will start to become clear who falls into which camp.
In the process of all this high-profile politicking, the party might not have the time or freedom to properly examine what went so massively wrong in Bihar, a state where as recently as September the BJP seemed to be leading. Its immediate response to the loss made sense and yet seemed willfully simplistic: It is all just caste arithmetic.
Under the scalpel
Others outside the party apparatus have, meanwhile, begun dissecting the results in earnest.
Commentary from the liberal set has mostly been predictable: It is a victory for anti-communal forces, a rejection of beef politics and a vote in favour of plurality – which 2014 was not. This tends to be followed up either with an exhortation for Modi to refocus on economics or triumphalism about the potential march of a national anti-Modi movement.
But it is the analysis of those who have been Modi supporters in the past that is the most interesting. Few are accepting the caste arithmetic argument. Instead, most of this commentary has come to a simple conclusion: Modi and the BJP have lost sight of what made them successful in 2014. And that means 2019 is in danger.
Sympathetic opinions
In fact, many explicitly say this. A sampling of comments from those who have supported the prime minister in the past:
*Ashok Malik in the Economic Times calls for a re-focus on economic policymaking and halting the "over-projection" of Modi as a vote winner: "Frankly, if Modi wants a second term, he has to act now as if the current term is his final term."
*Minhaz Merchant for DailyO writes that the party needs to learn to be inclusive not just with electoral communities but also with allies. "If the BJP cannot even counter him when Lalu launches his national anti-Modi campaign from Varanasi, it does not deserve to govern India after 2019."
*V Anantha Nageshwaran in Mint says that the BJP has failed to study either its failure or its successes well enough: "The baseline scenario has to be one of this government muddling through until 2019, when the country’s perdition resumes."
*Kanchan Gupta in ABP blames poor expectation management and Modi's government dragging its heels on the investment cycle: "Therein lies the reason why Modi Sarkar is now being seen, even by its ardent supporters, as dangerously close to running the risk of losing the plot. "
*Surajit Dasgupta in Swarajya writes that the government has simply been a "better Congress," and needs to attempt real reform: "If Modi draws that same, tired conclusion from the Bihar verdict, increasing the ambit of the state in the nation’s economy, it is end of achchhey din for Bharat. And then, in 2019, he will meet the fate Rao met with in 1996."
