With an eye on rural voters for the panchayat elections in 2017, the Congress party apparently has latched on to an aggressive line of communication to fetish on the ‘omelet’ of rural votes by panning ‘eggs’ on Ministers, and thereby fanning the so-called ‘onions’ (alleged scams) of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) quite effortlessly.
The gauntlet thrown by senior Congress leader lulu Mohapatra to BJD post its ‘tit for tat’ threat indicates the strategy of Congress party to trap BJD in toeing Congress line, and thereby setting the course for playing Panchayat poll-golf on its own terms. Since the 2017 Panchayat poll will be a semi-final to the Assembly polls in 2019, the Congress party seems pulling out all the tricks from electoral hat to stump the BJD and keep the ground hitting for the final date in 2019.
Significantly, BJD’s trump card in every election has been its leadership and cadre conjoined to the populist policies. Realising its facing a goliath in the upcoming rural poll, given the cadre strength of BJD, Congress sharpens its aisle with ‘dramatic’ twists to drive home aggressively its message on media wings akin to Aam Admi Party (AAP) style. Also, as BJD has no leadership problem and hence there being no confusion among cadres, the party always stays in election mood. However, with wide dissensions in Congress, the party clutches on to the trick of ‘egg-therapy’ for its cadre to sprint them up for electoral battle. With Rahul Gandhi’s General Jairam Ramesh casting his dice on ‘egged’ battle, the signal was for the cacophony of voices in Congress to play the symphony.
Meanwhile, BJD, which was caught off guard with Congress’ persistent ‘egg-bouncers’, is seriously mulling strategies to drive away the ‘bouncers’ to fence. A very senior party leader and prominent face in western Odisha indicated that BJD is closely watching the Congress strategy, and in the meantime, keep taking high moral ground, again on media wings, to fuel the cacophony in the Congress party in order to render the ‘egg’ to grow to a still-born baby. Moreover, BJD is dressing up a strategy to trap Congress in overdoing zeal to resurrect the image of ‘martyrdom’. And, martyrs gather more eye-ball and compassion in rural swathes than aggressions, he quipped.
Significantly, aggressions play up well in electoral politics when there is anti-incumbency. But sympathy works wonders when there is pro-incumbency. A ground-level sample study does suggest something brewing up on the ground, thanks to BJD’s mindless follies, especially post the ‘real fishy’ affairs in ration card distribution. But TINA (there is no alternative) leadership against Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik was also on display. However, it remains to be seen how it plays up as recent post-Nabakalebar fiasco showed the BJD’s ability to bounce back.