Upcoming state elections will decide the internal dynamics of parties
The best evidence of voters differentiating their preference between the two came from Odisha, where assembly polls were held simultaneously with that of Lok Sabha in 2019. Biju Janata Dal (BJD) won a resounding fifth straight term, winning 112 seats in a 146-strong assembly, but could corner only 12 of the 21 Lok Sabha seats, while BJP gained at its expense, adding eight seats to its national tally. There was roughly a 2% swing away from BJD to BJP between assembly and parliamentary polls, even though voting took place in the same period.
So, while it’s a legitimate exercise for pollsters to extrapolate assembly electoral outcomes on the national canvas, trend lines from elections over the past decade or so have exposed the limitations of such assessments. The national election is no more considered just a sum of state polls. Instead, state polls provide the base on which parties can rebuild themselves.
BJP in the coalition decades of 1990s and 2000s built itself on the back of strong state-level performances in Gujarat, MP, Chhattisgarh and, to some extent, in Rajasthan. Those outcomes kept BJP in the reckoning, despite Lok Sabha reversals in 2004 and 2009.
At present, Congress is working on a similar revival, especially after the recent victory in Karnataka that came on the back of a Himachal Pradesh win last year.
The upcoming round of polls is, thus, significant for the GOP, which is in contention in all five states, including Telangana and Mizoram.
The real impact, however, will be on the role and influence of satraps within both BJP and Congress. And this question is directly connected to the role and centrality of the party ‘high command’.
