As the BJP will see its maiden Government in the saddle in Agartala on Thursday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday described the ouster of the CPM dispensation in Tripura as a “victory of ideology” even as he exhorted party MPs to set their eyes on the next target of Karnataka and continue to do the victory lap by hard work.
Underlying the importance of party’s win in the North-Eastern States where they moved from zero to becoming hero, the Prime Minister said the people of the State were desperately seeking change for long from the left rule and in the BJP they got that choice.
Modi was addressing the BJP Parliamentary Party meeting, where he was greeted with the slogan, “Jeet hamari jaari hai, ab Karnataka ki bari hai” (Our winning run continues, now it’s Karnataka’s turn).
The Prime Minister, who had earlier described poll triumph of the BJP in Tripura as a result of poor peoples electoral response to the left’s high-handed rule in the State, also referred to the good performance of the party in Nagaland and Megahalya. Modi who on Saturday saw Tripura mandate as “vote par chot” (electoral decision vis-à-vis left unleashed violence) said people wanted to throw away the yoke of left from their shoulders. The BJP is now in power in seven of the eight N-E States.
Modi brushed aside comments that Tripura is a small State commanding only two lok Sabha seats saying it was a “ideological victory” for the party. In 2013 State poll, the BJP had scored less than two per cent votes in Tripura and was without a single seat in the Assembly.
The Prime Minister said the party won only one Assembly seat in Kerala before it went on to trounce the left in its bastion of Tripura. “Tripura was considered a bastion of Marxism for the last 25 years. This is an ideological victory,” party leaders quoted Modi as saying.
He said the left ideology is finished across the world and is on the verge of oblivion in India as it is now in power only in Kerala, Kumar said quoting Modi. Modi said the Centre will give priority to the development of Tripura, Meghalaya and Nagaland saying all States big or small were important.
With the Karnataka Assembly polls round the corner, Modi told the BJP MPs that the party will need to work hard to maintain its winning streak and asserted that there was an atmosphere of hope and expectation in the country, Kumar said.