Murmurs within the Bharatiya Janta Party’s (BJP) Punjab unit of parting ways with its ally, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), turned into boisterous voices on Tuesday which reverberated during the saffron party’s meeting.
Even as the State BJP president Shwet Malik maintained that the party would talk about enhancing its share of seats in the State with SAD at the “right time”, the majority of party leaders, including the district presidents, state office bearers, among others, attending Tuesday’s meeting, batted for going solo in the next state assembly polls.
The similar voices were also heard loud and clear after 2014 general elections when the BJP, riding high on the Narendra Modi wave, swept the country. However, the allimnace between the age-old allies — SAD and BJP — continued despite numerous ups and downs, braving differences between its leaders.
In fact, the two went on to contest 2017 state polls in alliance, but faced worst-ever defeat. As the Congress managed to form the government with 77 seats, SAD was limited to just 15 seats and BJP to just three. The nascent Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) pushed the SAD-BJP combine to the distant third and grabbing the coveted post of the Leader of Opposition in Vidhan Sabha.
Now with SAD president Sukhbir Badal and BJP’s Phagwara MLA Som Parkash elected as Lok Sabha MPs from Ferozepur and Hoshiarpur respectively, their tally has further came down.
“Ahead 2017, many are of the opinion that BJP should contest alone as anger against the SAD was high in the wake of sacrilege incidents besides the strong anti-incumbency factor against the 10-year-long SAD-BJP government. But then it was thought that BJP’s presence is not that strong in the State, especially in rural areas where it depends on SAD. And we contested 2017 elections, but the results were shameful,” a senior BJP leader, requesting anonymity, told The Pioneer.
The leader maintained that the Congress was “exploiting and politicising” the sacrilege issue to a great extent against SAD, “and this is also having an impact on BJP”.
Once again encouraged by the massive mandate in 2019 polls, the party leaders are once again pressing for going “on its own” in the next state assembly elections, and start its preparation for the same “without any delay”.
It has been learnt that during the meeting, the district level leaders, and also some of the senior leaders, underlined the BJP’s performance of winning two out of three seats it contested with an increased vote share from 8.6 to 9.56 percent — an increase from 12 lakhs votes in 2014 to 13.16 lakhs in 2019.
Another BJP leader pointed that Sukhbir’s victory in Ferozepur with the highest margin in the State owed to the BJP’s impact in urban areas of Abohar, Fazilka and Ferozepur city. Similarly, the Hindu votes, that were polled in favour of Narendra Modi, helped Harsimrat to win from Bathinda.
“SAD’s lost in Lambi — Akali patriarch Parkash Singh Badal’s constituency, but wins in Bathinda urban, Manpreet Badal’s segment, besides other urban areas like Bhucho and Budhlada,” added the leader.
During the meeting, one of the leader gave the example of neighbouring Haryana where the BJP contested alone and won all 10 seats in the recently-concluded general elections. The BJP had also swept the state assembly polls in Haryana in 2014 securing the majority for the first time ever.
Available information suggests that it was decided in the meeting that the party’s district units would start strengthening the party down to the grass root level, and covering all sections of societies, especially the urban voters, which have voted in favour of the MOdi Government.
However, state BJP president Malik maintained that talking about increase in seat share is not his priority. “My priority is to fulfil people’s expectation from the Modi government. My priority is to deliver the promises in return of the strong mandate given by the people,” he said.
Without divulging much, Malik said that the party would increase its strength. “Out booth management programme has been appreciated. We would increase our strength, we would strengthen the party’s organisational structure to make it reach to every household. And by doing this, I am sure there is nothing to stop you,” he said.
As per the current seat-sharing formula, the BJP contests on three of the 13 parliamentary and 23 of 117 assembly seats, while the Akali Dal fields its candidates on the remaining. In the recently-concluded Lok Sabha elections, BJP won Gurdaspur and Hoshiarpur but lost Amritsar seat to the Congress.