As the saffron waves grip eastern India, political observers start dissecting the massive electoral victory of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in West Bengal and consolidation of political power in Assam, where the nationalist party marks a consecutive third term win. The ruling alliance retained power in Assam with over a hundred winning seats in the 126-member assembly and the saffron party independently crossed the mark of two hundreds in the 294 Bengal legislators forum defeating the incumbent All India Trinamool Congress. The counting of votes on 4 May brought a rewarding result for the BJP as it independently succeeded in 82 constituencies where its trusted allies Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) and Bodoland People’s Front (BPF) got 10 seats each. In contrast, performance of the opposition Congress along with its electoral partners was restricted in 21 seats only, where the Gaurav Gogoi-led party was reduced to 19 legislators. Parliamentarian Gogoi himself faced the defeat of three-time BJP legislator Hitendra Nath Goswami.
Mentionable is that all mainstream exit polls predicted the BJP’s landslide victory in Assam and indirectly put chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma in his chair once again. His aggressive poll campaign, precisely the anti-Miya (read Bangladesh origin Muslim settlers in the region) rhetoric, attracted a huge section of residents, who still remain apprehensive about their religious and socio-cultural identities in their homeland. Moreover, the government successfully implemented a number of initiatives covering infrastructure development, welfare and transparent employment in Assam. Sarma also lured former Assam Congress president Bhupen Bora and Parliamentarian Pradyut Bordoloi to join the saffron party. When Bora won the electoral battles, the opposition in Assam assembly Debabrat Saikia and another former Assam Congress president Ripun Bora lost in their respective seats.
Amid all visible factors in favour of Sarma to put the BJP on the scoring table, there were inherent contributions from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS, a unique socio-cultural outfit) which organized thousands of Hindu Sanmilans in Assam celebrating the voluntary organization’s centenary year and incidentally on the eve of assembly polls. The Sangh had footprints in the alienated region far ahead of the BJP merges as a prominent political party. The Swayamsevaks publicly campaigned for hundred percent voting through personal meetings, public gatherings and social media campaigns. Thus they encouraged and motivated, precisely the Hindu voters to exercise their franchises with no usual hesitations and an overwhelming percentage (85.91) of voting directly helped the BJP nominees. On the other hand, those tried to exploit the issue of Zubeen’s unusual death in Singapore and subsequent trials in the electoral battles failed miserably. They presumed that the young population would vote against the ruling alliance as the ‘Justice for Zubeen’ campaign touched millions of fans and well-wishers of the revered cultural icon. However, Assam electorates responded in a completely different way. Needless to mention that, the close family members of Zubeen urged everyone not to politicise his untimely death and subsequent trials for electoral gains, but some elements put a deaf ear to her.
Meanwhile, a coroner’s court in Singapore ruled that the 53-year old singer died due to accidental drowning, even as investigations in Assam treated the case as a suspected murder. The opposition leaders immediately took up the issue and demanded an accountability to the investigations carried out by Assam police personnel over Zubeen’s death, where murder charges were slapped against four individuals. Responding to their allegations, the outspoken chief minister commented that the Singapore conclusion had strengthened the case registered in Assam. Highlighting that Assam investigation was independent of Singapore’s, Sarma pointed out that both the investigations revealed that Zubeen consumed alcohol crossing the permissible limit. The additional aspect in the Assam probe was that Zubeen was made to consume alcohol on the previous night as part of a larger conspiracy. Besides Congress leader Gogoi, Asom Jatiya Parisahd chief Lurinjyoti Gogoi remained vocal over the Zubeen issue and pledged for an early justice to the singer, if voted to power. Thus they simply ignored the repeated appeals from Zubeen’s widow Garima Saikia Garg not to use his name for electoral gains and amazingly both were routed by the electorates.
A phenomena needs to be discussed, understood and resolved in a proper forum!
Saffron surge in Assam, Bengal, etc
