The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party under Prime Minister Narendra Modi sounded the election bugle on Wednesday when finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman reached out to women, marginalised groups, financially weaker sections, and the middle class through the last full budget before the 2024 general elections.
The upcoming 2024 elections are extremely crucial for PM Modi as it will be the first time that a non-Congress government will seek a consecutive third term. The importance of the polls can also be understood from the fact that Modi is the first sitting PM who was born in independent India and is now seeking a third consecutive term to complete 15 years in office.
With just 15 months left for the Lok Sabha polls, the union government has tried to ensure that its message of inclusive development reaches all sections of population and the fruits of development reach poor and financially weaker sections of the country.
“We envision a prosperous and inclusive India, in which the fruits of development reach all regions and citizens, especially our youth, women, farmers, OBCs (other backward classes), Scheduled Castes, and Scheduled Tribes… We ensured that no one went to bed hungry during the Covid-19 pandemic by providing free food grains to over 80 crore people for 28 months. Continuing our commitment, we have a scheme to supply free food grain to all Antyodaya and priority households for the next one year…” said finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her budget speech.
The role of beneficiaries of government schemes has been a game changer for the BJP under PM Modi as the 32 crore beneficiaries have been instrumental in bringing the BJP back to power in the 2019 general elections and also in the electoral success it enjoyed in assembly elections since 2014.
Going by the election data of the Election Commission of India, BJP had received over 17.16 crore votes in 2014, when it won 282 seats on its own, but there was a drastic increase in the voter base of the BJP in 2019 LS polls, when it won 22.90 crore votes and managed to win 303 seats. In the 2019 elections, PM Modi received an additional 5.74 crore votes.
Speaking about the inclusive development message of the union government since 2014, when PM Modi came to power for the first time, Sitharaman pointed out that 11.7 crore households were provided toilets, there were 9.6 crore cooking gas connections, 47.8 crore Jan Dhan bank accounts, 44.6 crore people had insurance cover and 11.4 crore farmers had received Rs. 2.2 lakh crore in the past few years.
Apart from the poor and marginalised voters, the government has attempted to please the middle and lower classes with the tax breaks announced in this budget. Although people have been expecting the union government to make changes in the personal income tax for the past couple of years, the move finally comes just before the 2024 general elections.
Even as the union government tried to woo different sections of population, the first test of the impact of the budget will come in the nine assembly elections that the ruling party, along with its alliance members, will face before the 2024 electoral contest.
Among the states that will have a decisive impact on the mood of the people are Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Chhattisgarh polls, where the BJP performed well both in 2014 and 2019 polls. These states will go to polls in the run up to the Lok Sabha elections and hold the key to the BJP's success in the general elections. In the 2019 elections when the BJP returned to power with a greater mandate, it won 87 out of 93 Lok Sabha seats from just these four states.
Similarly, the four states of the north east, Mizoram, Nagaland, Meghalaya, and Tripura are a reminder to the party that it needs to strengthen its alliances for the 2024 polls. The north eastern states have a total of 25 Lok Sabha seats, and BJP has managed to dominate in these seats for the past two general elections.
“This is a feel good budget as there is something for the poor, women, and marginalised sections. However, it is clear that the government is focusing on the lower and middle classes ahead of the elections. Everyone had been expecting the government to make these changes for the past few years, but it has finally happened just before the general elections. This move will be key to woo the people in the urban centres of the country,” said Sanjay Kumar, Professor and Co-Director of Lokniti, at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies.
Gyan Verma was Senior Editor (Politics) at Mint. He has been a journalist for nearly two decades and writes on the politics and intersection of policy and politics.
The views expressed here are those of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views of BQ Prime or its editorial team.
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