It is election time again. Every round of state elections is unique in its own way. This one is special for one of the two states going to the polls in December is Gujarat, the Hindutva laboratory where the Bharatiya Janata Party has held sway for 22 years.
Just a month ago, the election seemed like another shoo-in for the BJP against a Congress party that seemed even weaker in the state than before. All that has changed. For the first time since 2002, the BJP seems to have a fight on its hands and the Congress is suddenly looking rejuvenated.
How has Scroll.in been reporting this election?
The coverage has been somewhat different from the usual. There has been very little about which party is doing well where, or which community is threatening to switch sides in which constituency, the staple of election coverage.
A more interesting kind of coverage that Scroll.in has offered on Gujarat is around, and not on, the elections.
Gujarat coverage
Coincidence or not, M Rajshekhar’s reports from the Ear to the Ground series, published this very fortnight, gave remarkable insights into what ticks in Gujarat’s politics, something that was not to be found in coverage elsewhere, which was largely the run-of-the-mill variety.
The two articles on the dairy sector (this and this) were about the dark clouds collecting over the Amul federation. In the process, the articles also investigated the changes that have taken place in the control of individual cooperatives, and the stranglehold the BJP now exercises over all cooperatives in Gujarat. The implications for the Assembly elections are obvious.
An equally fascinating but also troubling article was the one by the same writer about how the BJP’s control permeates all levels of the state in Gujarat, and why, therefore, electoral change will be difficult even if the voter is unhappy.
Another interesting kind of reportage was that by Aarefa Johari in the series, First Vote, where she looked at the aspirations and voting preferences of first-time voters from different communities and backgrounds in five districts in Saurashtra and Kutch. We had one on Dalits, one on Patidars, one on rural Other Backward Classes, one on Muslims and the last one on young livestock farmers in Kutch. This kind of reporting, too, was not something other publications did, though one wishes the articles had been edited to a more concise length (an observation I have often made about many of the features on Scroll.in).
Interesting as these two sets of articles were, one also missed the traditional reporting of the heat and dust of electioneering in Scroll.in’s coverage. There was this worrying report by Dhirendra K Jha on the methods and strategies used in certain localities to prevent the minorities from voting. That was an exception.
It was not until the very end of the electioneering process that we had this very rounded piece by Supriya Sharma on the mood of the electorate, focussing on the weakening (note, weakening, not demolition) of the Narendra Modi persona.
Room for improvement
Unfortunately, while Scroll.in reporting was distinctive and different, one cannot say the same for the opinion pieces it published. Leave aside the odd piece such as the one by Shiv Viswanathan about the views of the archbishop of Gandhinagar, the rest by contributors and the staff did not shine much light on either the issues or the processes. The Gujarat elections and the nature of campaigning offered promise for rich analysis of many issues. Be it the Patidar anger or the sudden revival of the Congress or the Hardik Patel persona or even the ugly campaign speeches of the prime minister, there was much to be analysed and understood. We did not see that on Scroll.in.
Video too was disappointing. The one on the Gujarat model went over the same issues that have been covered for years. It had one interview with the economist Maitreesh Ghatak who did give a comprehensive perspective, but the video had just that one interview, and so may have been better titled as an interview with Ghatak.
I cannot claim that Scroll.in’s writers took my earlier suggestion that they should not make predictions of the outcome, but it was good to see that none of them did this time, on Gujarat at least. One article did put together the results of the pre-poll surveys and said that they pointed to a BJP victory. However, that article just compiled surveys and did not make its own prediction.
This was, though, not the case about elections in Himachal Pradesh, about which Scroll.in suggested in one article that based on past trends and an assessment of voter mood the BJP would come out on top. That is indeed the received wisdom, though readers would have been better served with reporting on voter mood and the issues they are concerned about.
Indeed, I think Scroll.in neglected to properly report on the Himachal Pradesh elections. There were numerous reports on the Himachal elections on Scroll.in, but they were essentially compilations of agency reports. However, as far as reporting by Scroll.in’s own reporters goes, I found just this sole piece of reporting on the concerns of apple growers about the Goods and Services Tax and how that may influence their decisions on voting day. Himachal is a small state and it may not be Modi’s home state, but it did deserve better coverage.
All in all, the distinctiveness of Scroll.in’s reporting on Gujarat was refreshing. Readers could not have asked for more. Perhaps the videos and the opinion pieces will be better in the next set of Assembly elections. The only gap, if one can call it that, is the neglect of the elections in Himachal Pradesh.
The Readers’ Editor can be contacted at readerseditor@scroll.in
