AAP disgraced and left Front marginalized
By winning five of the 10 Assembly seats for which by-elections were held across eight States, the Bharatiya Janata Party has maintained the momentum of its emphatic win in the 2014 lok Sabha election and subsequent State Assembly polls. Of the recent gains, two stand out for their long-term impact. The first is the triumph in Delhi's Rajouri Garden seat. The BJP-Akali Dal combine snatched the seat from the Aam Aadmi Party, which was relegated to the third position — behind the Congress. This is the coalition's first win since the AAP's sweep in 2015, when the latter secured a whopping 67 of the 70 seats on offer. With days to go for the Municipal Corporation of Delhi poll, the victory comes as a shot in the arm for the BJP. The other significant performance has been in a West Bengal constituency, where the party pushed the left Front to the third spot and the Congress to a poor fourth. Although the seat has been won by the ruling Trinamool Congress in the State, the BJP secured a vote share of more than 30 per cent, and is clearly emerging as the main opposition to the Trinamool Congress. Apart from Odisha, West Bengal is the other eastern State where the BJP has been struggling to get a foothold. With its excellent show in the recently concluded local body election in Odisha and its growing vote-share in West Bengal, there are indications that the party could be the one to watch out for, by the ruling regional outfits there. The BJP's victories in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Assam were along expected lines, though its failure in the two seats in Karnataka must have disappointed it. A win here would have been a morale-booster for the party ahead of the Assembly election in the State in 2018. The BJP will have to get the caste equations right and the State unit must unite before D-Day.
It's interesting that two parties are losing their grip on the States they have been dominant in. The Aam Aadmi Party candidate not just lost the Rajouri Garden constituency but also forfeited his deposit. This is a major embarrassment for a party that had only two years ago decimated its rivals in the State election. It's a message that the people are getting fed up of AAP's rule and its focus on other States at the cost of governing Delhi efficiently. The Rajouri Garden defeat comes on the heels of its poor show in both Punjab and Goa — nearly all its candidates lost their deposits in the latter State. Instead of abusing its rivals and blaming the electronic voting machine for its defeats, the AAP must look within for the downfall. Although it is seeking to contain the damage by saying that the by-poll setback will not impact its prospects in the coming civic election, the fact is that its Rajouri Garden candidate had used civic poll issues in his campaign, such as the house tax matter. The other party which is facing an existential crisis in its one-time bastion is the Communist Party of India (Marxist). In the good old days, it would have been a close second if not the winner, in West Bengal. Today, that spot has been occupied by the BJP. The left Front, of which the CPI(M) is the main constituent, got just 10 per cent of the votes in the by-election. And yet, like the AAP, the communists remain rooted to the old and discredited forms of politics.