‘Hard Work’, Alliances Behind BJP’s Northeast Surge

The Bharatiya Janata party's “hard work” and flexible alliances helped it defeat the Left in Tripura and gain ground in Nagaland and Meghalaya.

“It's no fluke or sheer luck but hard work and effective election management” that has led to BJP's performance, senior BJP leader Sheshadari Chari said in conversation with Bloomberg Quint.

The BJP won 35 seats in Tripura, unseating the five-term Manik Sarkar government of the CPI(M). In Nagaland, its alliances with both the NDPP and NPF ensure a government with BJP presence. In Meghalaya, a fractured mandate has seen the Congress emerge as the single-largest party, but the BJP is making efforts to form a government that will keep the Congress out.

For more, click here for Tripura, Nagaland and Meghalaya

“The whole narrative is that the Northeast has moved in favour of the BJP,” said Sanjay Kumar, co-director at LokNiti. Even in Meghalaya, the BJP has increased its vote share from 1.27 percent in 2013 to nearly 10 percent in 2018.

While Tripura and Nagaland send only three representatives to the Lok Sabha, the election results come as a relief to the BJP grappling with the narrative of diminishing popularity following election results in Gujarat and bypoll results from Rajasthan. The BJP now has governments in six out of seven northeastern states that send a total of 23 MPs to the lower house.

“The BJP is going to increase its tally in northeastern states in 2019 elections,” Kumar said. This will help offset possible losses from Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan

For the Congress, the bad news comes before the crucial elections in Karnataka. The Congress now has governments in only three states. The leading opposition party was reduced to zero seats in both Tripura and Nagaland, while a clear majority eludes it in Meghalaya.

Party spokesperson Ranajit Mukherjee is optimistic. The significant loss of the CPI(M) in Tripura points to a sharp bi-polar contest in 2019, he said.