AA Edit | PM exhorts poll-ready BJP to perform, win trust of all

It appears that the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has entered the final and intensive leg of the campaign for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections with Prime Minister Narendra Modi calling upon the party cadre to work on a mission mode in the next 100 days and to ensure that the party gets the trust of all sections of people. The Prime Minister is confident that the 10 years of governance under him will get the party 370 seats and the alliance, 400.

Mr Modi’s speech and the resolutions passed at party’s national council meeting have laid out its plan for the elections: NDA will bank heavily on the beneficiaries of the Union government’s welfare schemes; India’s position as the world’s fifth largest economy and its cruise towards the third position; the construction and the consecration of the Ram temple, the Amrit Kaal of India’s goal of becoming a developed nation by 2047 and corruption and dynastic politics of the Opposition.

The BJP’s social engineering has been by and large successful and the party has expanded its base, coopting the most marginalised people, including those belonging to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Knowing fully well that it is next to impossible to obliterate the reality of the caste system and to cover up for its unwillingness to declare a war on it, Mr Modi has now come up with a new narrative of four castes — the farmer, the women, the youth and the poor, and has declared his aim will be their uplift.

A communicator par excellence, Mr Modi can be successful in driving home any point that he would wish Indians to hear. However, as Prime Minister of two terms, he will be required to place his report card before the very same people whom he has vowed to serve. A section of the farmers is on the road with a list of demands which included a legal guarantee for the minimum support price. Mr Modi had in 2016 promised that the farmers’ income will be doubled by 2022; it will be better if he can tell the nation how far the government has been successful in achieving the goal.

There were a series of programmes aimed at women, including the Ujjwala scheme and the Swachh Bharat sanitation mission, which had an impact on them, especially those in the rural areas. A status report of these schemes also will be in order. As for the youth, the BJP’s promise in 2014 was to create two crore jobs a year but all available data points to the high level of unemployment in the country.

The Prime Minister, citing NITI Aayog data, has insisted that the government has lifted 25 crore people from poverty in the last nine years, which is a commendable feat indeed. The government’s recent decision to extend the free ration scheme for about 80 crore people for another five years is a measure of government’s concern for the poor on the one hand; on the other, it puts the government’s claims over poverty alleviation under a cloud of suspicion.

However, it’s not the hard facts or data that deliver electoral dividends. It’s the ability to convince the electorate about the narrative of a better future for them. The BJP has identified the narratives, and the effort now will be to sell it among the people. Mr Modi’s exhortation of the BJP cadre for 100 days of hard work is not for no reason.