BJP’s Hanuman jump in Haryana

Ahmedabad, 19 October 2014

BJP’s Hanuman jump in Haryana is interesting.

The party won only 4 assembly seats in year 2009 assembly elections. In Haryana politics, BJP was nowhere in picture, and was not taken seriously in those days.

In 2014 general elections BJP contested 8 seats and won 7 of them. There are total 10 Lok Sabha seats in Haryana. The other 2 were contested by BJP allies.

BJP’s victory in 7 Lok Sabha seats in Haryana was equal to 62 assembly segments. Based on this verdict, BJP president Amit Shah figured out strike rate of BJP if party contests all 90 assembly seats on its own.

BJP turned down the demand of allotment of large number of seats to its allies and went alone.

Result? In Haryana, the BJP has won an overwhelming and unthinkable victory . BJP has increased its tally from 4 in 2009 to 48 seats and has increased its vote tally from 9 per cent to 33.02 per cent.

Columnist Ashok Malik describes BJP’s Haryana triumph in these words: the superlative victory in Haryana constitutes perhaps the BJP’s most impressive electoral triumph ever, more impressive than even the Lok Sabha election victory of 2014. The low base from which the party started even six months ago, the absence of an effective state leadership, the limited base and social coalition the BJP traditionally represented in Haryana: All of these were overcome in a dramatic turnaround that piggybacked on the remarkable showing in the parliamentary contest.