New Delhi. The thumping victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party against the scattered opposition camp in Gujarat on the basis of Hindutva, nationalism and development has boosted its chances of winning the 2024 Lok Sabha elections once again.
But the victory of the Congress in Himachal Pradesh on the basis of local issues has indicated that the BJP is not a political force that cannot be defeated.
The Aam Aadmi Party’s foray into Gujarat has posed a challenge to the BJP, but at the national level it has presented a bigger challenge to the Congress ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
The BJP got 156 seats in the 182-member Gujarat Assembly with a vote share of 52.5 per cent. The main opposition Congress was reduced to 17 seats with 27 per cent votes, while AAP got five seats with around 13 per cent votes.
The Gujarat results are considered very positive for the BJP and party leaders believe that its national agenda has worked in the state.
These results also show that the brand of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is intact and the Prime Minister is the biggest trump card of this party in mobilizing voters in favor of BJP.
On broad issues of governance and ideology, says a BJP leader, people trust Modi and the BJP more than any other party.
We saw this earlier in Uttar Pradesh and some other states and are now seeing it in Gujarat. He said that as the 2024 election battle draws closer, the Modi factor and the wider national issue will matter more.
This Gujarat victory has indicated that there is no serious challenge before the BJP for 2024. There is no doubt that the BJP remains the dominant party and will be very difficult to defeat in 2024, says Mahendra Nath Thakur, professor of political science at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
He also says that the victory of the Congress in Himachal Pradesh also sends a message that the BJP is not such a political force that cannot be defeated. In the 68-member assembly of Himachal Pradesh, Congress got 40 seats while BJP got 25 seats.
