Money matters in Indian elections but it is no guarantee for victory
2024 general elections is that their outcome is a foregone conclusion. It's Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'guarantee' that NDA will return with 400-plus seats. Even if the outcome falls short by 100 seats, BJP will remain comfortably in power for another five years. So, it may be a bit strange to also hear that BJP is projected to spend more than double of what it did in the 2019 general elections.
2024 Lok Sabha elections are the most expensive polls not just in India's history but in the world's, according to The Economist. Centre for Media Studies (CMS) has projected an expenditure of ₹1.35 lakh crore, double the amount spent in 2019. In 2019, BJP outspent Congress by almost a factor of three. This year's gap will most likely increase given that BJP is flush with funds, and Congress has its accounts 'frozen' — or, rather, some of the party's accounts 'attached' by the I-T department for alleged non-payment of dues as per I-T rules.
Can you imagine what political parties would have spent if the electoral field was more competitive, and the election was not a 'foregone conclusion'? In the US, which has the second-highest spending on elections, elections are fought on small margins. For instance, the difference in the projected polling averages for Donald Trump and Joe Biden in the forthcoming elections, based on polls during April, was less than 2%, with the margin falling to less than 1% in the second half of the month, according to psephologist Nate Silver's 538 website on ABC News.
In the last general
