When the BJP first assumed power in Karnataka from 2008-13 (barring a weeklong stint in November 2007) it was deemed to be the precursor to the party’s significant entry into the South. There had been Janata Party and Janata Dal governments in Karnataka in the past but for the most part there were Congress governments, and unlike in the North where the grand old party had been comprehensively eclipsed, in the South it still had a notable presence in Karnataka and in Kerala while in Andhra it had lost its sheen after being in power for long.
In the nascent state of Telangana in more recent times and in Dravidian-dominated Tamil Nadu it has not been in the best of shapes, reduced in the latter to a pale shadow of its earlier existence. Today, it is at the crossroads. The South is the only region where Rahul Gandhi enjoys a higher popularity rating than Prime Minister Modi if some recent opinion polls are anything to go by. In all other regions, Modi is leagues ahead of Rahul.
Per se, there is greater religious tolerance in the South than in the North and West and while the BJP’s bias towards the Hindi language is marked, in the South the Hindutva influence is marginal except in Karnataka. In the upcoming Lok Sabha polls too, the South offers little promise for the BJP overall. Its best bet continues to be Karnataka where it is fighting the Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) combine which has been in the saddle thanks to an uneasy alliance even though the BJP had won more seats than both of them individually in the last Assembly polls.
The Karnataka BJP’s achiles heel is the absence of credible leadership. The current strongman, B S Yeddyurappa, is controversial due to a corruption taint that has stuck to him. Yeddy, as he is called, has few friends in political circles but the absence of a viable alternative to him within the BJP keeps him afloat. The saving grace for the BJP is the infighting in the non-BJP ruling camp with Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy and his predecessor from the Congress Siddaramaiah at each other’s throat.
Animosity between the two runs deep from 2005 when Siddaramaiah quit the JD (S) after a major public showdown with party supremo H D Deve Gowda and son Kumaraswamy vowing to decimate the JD (S). While Congress president Rahul Gandhi has brokered an uneasy peace for now, there is no surety that the coalition would survive the Lok Sabha elections in which the BJP is expected to have an edge over the Congress-JD (S) combine. Until the crisis over the court-inspired women’s entry into the famed Sabarimala temple erupted, the BJP seemed on the ascendant in Kerala with its vote share rising with every successive election, but in recent times the party’s stock has plummeted.
With the virtual stagnation that has ensued, the BJP cannot be assured of any seats in Kerala despite an enhanced vote share. With the BJP being anathema to both the principal parties — the Congress and the Left — the party is virtually friendless in this southern state and is looked upon by many as a trouble-maker. The cadres of the RSS have been active in Kerala to swing Hindu votes in BJP’s favour but there still is a long way to go in translating higher percentage of votes into assembly seats.
In a state in which the minorities are a sizable vote bank, the BJP’s perceived anti-minorityism doubtlessly alienates the party from them. The pull of the Hindu religious element is not so strong as to polarise the electorate to a degree that brings the BJP some seats. The Left and the Congress have carved out a niche for themselves in a state in which the education quotient is high. Whether the rewards of cadre-based mobilisation would work for the BJP is premature to say.
Apparently, the time is not ripe yet for reaping rewards.In Andhra, the displacement of the Congress party led to the resurgence of a party of regional pride and identity — the Telugu Desam. While it was N T Rama Rao who rabble-roused the voter to spurn the Congress whose then leader Rajiv Gandhi was deemed to have hurt the pride of the Andhra people by insulting then Chief Minister T Anjaiah, it is NTR’s later estranged son-in-law Chandrababu Naidu who is capitalising on that sentiment now by continuing to stoke the regional pride card.
Chandrababu’s snapping of alliance with BJP has left the latter high and dry but it has also severely dented the chances of Telugu Desam in the upcoming elections. The BJP’s only hope is a post-poll arrangement with the YSR Congress of Jagan Mohan Reddy but Reddy has been tight-lipped on the possibility of such an alliance.
In Tamil Nadu, the BJP has little to gloat about. For long, it was banking on uncertain AIADMK support in any crisis during Jayalalithaa’s time and in this election too, it is dependent on that party. But the party today is not a patch on how powerful it was in Jaya’s time. How things would pan out is anybody’s guess but with a mere five seats allotted to it, the BJP is groping in this southern state.
Clearly, the BJP has much to ponder about in southern India. A poor showing in the South will make it incumbent to make a mark in the other regions which it predictably will. It is despite its lack of stamp in the South that the BJP is poised for a second term at the Centre.
Kamlendra Kanwar is a political commentator and columnist. He has authored four books.
