By Tukoji R. Pandit     
New Delhi (Syndicate Features): The Bharatiya Janata Party is understandably ecstatic after its victory in the Karnataka assembly polls because most pollsters had given the party at the most 100 seats in the 224-member house and thus indicating the possibility of a non-BJP alliance coming to power in the southern state. But the BJP is wrong in citing its Karnataka victory as a ‘turning point’ (L.K. Advani) or a sure stepping stone for invading the rest of South India.

The euphoria in the BJP camp is designed to demoralise its rivals. With the UPA government deciding to chicken out of the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal the possibility of early parliamentary polls has become remote. The BJP will, therefore have to wait for almost 12 months before it enters the big battle of 2009. And who knows which way the wind will blow a year from now? 

The talk of the BJP taking over the rest of South India makes no sense. Andhra Pradesh, despite giving the BJP two presidents, has accepted regional parties as alternative to the Congress. The BJP can only walk with the help of crutches provided by these regional parties in Andhra Pradesh.

The people of Kerala do not look beyond the alliances led respectively by the Congress and the CPI (M). Well, the CPI (M) in Kerala does turn its gaze on the BJP sometimes but it generally ends in much violence that may win some sympathy for the BJP but not enough votes in that highly polarised state.

Tamil Nadu is fiercely loyal to Dravidian parties and the BJP does not have even a remote chance of challenging the hold of the retired Tamil film fraternity that dominates the Dravidian parties.     
   
Some of the facts that have emerged after the poll results do not suggest that the BJP’s victory in Karnataka was all that emphatic. To begin with, the party did not get a clear majority, falling short of three. It had to turn to victorious Congress rebels to add up the numbers. The percentage share of the BJP at 33.9 was lower than the Congress’ 34.6. But in an election what matters most is who gets to sit on the treasury benches. In the end the BJP managed that feat with ease.

The defeated ‘secular’ camp of the Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular) has to worry about certain long-term consequences following the Karnataka polls. The Congress has more to worry as it has to fight to retain power at the Centre while the JD(S) has to ward off a further disintegration—by no means an unfamiliar problem for it. 

The biggest worry for the Congress will be to find a strategy to halt the saffron march in evidence for over a year in the shape of BJP winning most state assembly polls. The Congress has to work out the puzzle that it lost many of these polls more badly than most pre-poll projections.

Poll forecasters are generally derided when they go wrong, but it will be wrong to assume that they base their predictions on pure imagination. It can be inferred that if the Congress fared worse than expected it botched up its chances during the run up to the polls.

Probably the fault with the pollsters was that they did not take into consideration the state of the party’s health. If they had, the predictions about the Congress tally in the polls would have been invariably shorter as the party appears to be in disarray almost everywhere in India. There is too much of adhocism in running the organisation. Party chiefs forced on the states by the high command are clearly at a disadvantage in building up a strong cohesive team in their state and they find it difficult to enthuse the rank and file. The vice president of the Karnataka PCC, H. Hanumanthappa, reportedly admitted that the Congress was ‘unorganised’ and questioned the selection of party candidates on the basis of their ability to ‘match’ the rival candidates instead of their winning potential.

While it may be true that the central ‘high command’ plays a big role at the time of selection of candidates of all ‘national’ parties, the Congress clings to this rule more steadfastly. In Karnataka, as in many previous state assembly polls, the criterion of selecting candidates was not necessarily his or her winning potential but family tree—parents as old timers in the Congress--and proximity to the ‘high command’. If that was not bad enough lately the Congress has also got into the habit of relying on too many rebels—some might call them ‘rejects’—from rival parties. Most of the prominent dissidents from the JD(S) in Karnataka who had crossed over to the Congress bit the dust, as did the offspring of many old party stalwarts.         
  
Though one of the reasons that supposedly led to the Congress defeat in Karnataka was its inability to name its chief ministerial candidate it did appear to many observers that S.M. Krishna was the choice—of the high command. He was clearly a big player of the Congress during the pre-poll campaign. Yet he had returned from his assignment at Mumbai’s Raj Bhavan just a few months before the polls. It is not surprising that the party coordination committee that Krishna headed did not meet during two of the three-phase assembly polls when elections were held in 158 (out of 224) constituencies.

On the other hand the man BJP had said would lead the party in case it won was active all along, especially after the JD(S) failed to honour the agreement of power-sharing between the two parties. He had his finger on the people’s pulse all along.  There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that the JD(S) had ‘betrayed’ the BJP. The people of Karnataka had probably decided on the day of that great ‘betrayal’ that the JD(S) should be punished. The anger that it generated also meant that anyone who befriended the JD(S) would also meet the same treatment. A Congress seen flirting with the JD(S) could not have expected large-scale favours from the voters who were in such angry mood.

Frankly, the public mood is fickle. The BJP has come to power after making some tall promises on matters concerning daily lives and also on disputes with the neighbouring Tamil Nadu. As has been just seen in another BJP-ruled state, Rajasthan, many of these electoral promises tend to become a big headache for the ruling party, engineering widespread discontent among the electorate. The BJP has a daunting task in retaining its hold over the voters in Karnataka. Its focus, however, is not on them but other states in the region—and the big throne at Delhi. (Syndicate Features)