The game that started after Lok Sabha elections ascended to its peak last week, and Bharatiya Janata Party’s winning juggernaut went on to conquer its dream fort of Bengal. Now, irrespective of which party you wanted to win in Bengal, there are enough grounds to discuss whether the elections were even fair and how much of an impact the so-called Special Intensive Revision (SIR) had on the final results. In this Blog, I will discuss the Bengal results in detail and take a look at where the BJP and Opposition stand currently ahead of the next general elections.

The SIR Question

When the Election Commission announced the SIR just 3 months ahead of Bihar elections, political observer Yogendra Yadav had said that it’s just an experiment, the real ground for the exercise is Bengal. In Bihar, a state with low literacy, the SIR led to haphazard deletions of lakhs of people. Of course, many of the official 65 lakh deletions were needed (dead, shifted, duplicates), but a lot of genuine voters too were disenfranchised just because they lacked proper documents. Though, NDA would have retained the state even without the SIR, but the exercise made sure to widen the victory margin to unprecedented levels.

Following Bihar, the ECI announced the SIR exercise in 12 other states/UTs, mostly the ones going to polls in 2026-27 cycle, including Bengal. In the initial phase of the exercise, around 58 lakh names were deleted. No one batter an eye till then, as barring few, most deletions looked genuine. Further, in transitioning from draft roll to final roll, 5.5 lakh more names were deleted. Even till now, the numbers were in par with other major states (97L deletions in Tamil Nadu, 65L deletions in Gujarat). However, the ECI hadn’t played their biggest card yet. Out of nowhere, the electoral officers were instructed to put the voters under adjudication, citing “doubtful voters” and “logical discrepancies”. This suddenly made over 1.25 crore voters running to one office to other, proving their citizenship. What was particularly shocking is that none of these clauses were being applied in any other state undergoing SIR. Even baffling were reports saying the electoral officers were instructed about using the new clause not through any official channel but on WhatsApp! And it’s the country’s apex poll body we are talking about.

Also, a report by the Reporter’s Collective found how the ECI used a totally untested software to compare today’s names with 2002 rolls. This meant even differences like Banerjee-Bandhopadhyay, Mohammad-Mohammed, and women whose surnames got changed after marriage; all found themselves under adjudication. Till last dates, voters kept running here and there in front of tribunals to get their names back on the rolls, but even when the voter rolls freezed, the fate of 27 lakh voters were still undecided. And just when the people had their biggest hopes pinned on the country’s judiciary, the SPINELESS apex court and its Chief Justice Suryakant shamelessly uttered, “not voting in one election won’t wash away your rights forever”. For a fact, the court is yet to decide whether the so-called SIR exercise is constitutional or not. So, this is a very easy template by the Judiciary now, that to evade giving a ruling against the Central government, just keep delaying the case for so long, that the case loses its value altogether.

People were forced to stand in long queues to prove their citizenship, mostly due to clerical errors 

Eventually, the court allowed the tribunals to keep hearing the cases. However, till the elections only 1700 odd cases could be heard, over 99.5% of which were added back in the list. This clearly shows had others got the chance, in most likelihood they could also have made it back to the list. Also, just days ahead of the polls, ECI announced that 7 lakh new voters were added in the list. But very surprisingly, no details were provided who were these? Whether they were doubtful voters, who came back on the list or new voters altogether. Everything was just opaque.

In my opinion, the opposition parties including ruling TMC should have refused from participating in the elections till all the names under adjudication get proper hearings. And, I am not even getting into the the prospect of any genuine voter that could’ve been deleted out of the remaining 65 lakh deletions (total 91 lakh). Mamata Banerjee did raise the issue strongly, even went to the top court herself to present the case, but the opposition overall (including TMC) looked complacent and were somehow fine with adjudicated names being left out of the polls. I can’t even imagine such a sham being allowed in any proper democratic country(which India isn’t). In all likelihood, either the judiciary would have intervened or the opposition would have boycotted the polls.

Now, can we say the SIR exercise is the sole reason behind BJP’s victory in Bengal? No. There are many sets of data analysis that confirm how many seats were impacted and possibly tilted with SIR. However, almost every analysis has come to the conclusion thag BJP could’ve gone past the majority mark even without the SIR. Fair point. But, my question is can an election where as many voters, as was the difference between two parties, were deleted, even be called an ‘election’? A person doesn’t need to prove that his/her vote could’ve changed the CM face to ensure that denial of his vote was injustice. And the tepid response (and in many cases denial) among public and media against the whole voter fraud issue – despite ample evidence being available – is not just baffling but also worrying.

Mamata Banerjee is one of the tallest women leaders and fiercest opposition voices in country (Photo: India Today)

Rise and Fall of Mamata Banerjee

From being a street fighter leader in Congress, to getting on to form a new party from scratch and leading and winning a long lone battle against the three-decade plus hegemony of the Left in Bengal, Mamata Banerjee’s rise as a leader is worth a case study. In my opinion, she is the TALLEST woman leader in the country after ex-PM Indira Gandhi (Jayalalitha and Mayawati might come close, but they inherited a party founded by a strong male leader, unlike Mamata who started from scratch). Getting up on the bonnet of veteran leader Jayprakash Narayan, sustaining severe head injury after beaten by communist mob, dragged from Writer’s Building for protesting against a rape case, three-time CM, two-time time Union Minister…there are story after story to describe her meteoric rise in politics.

Coming from a humble background, always seen in a common white saree attire, helped Mamata in developing a strong connect with people. Her USP always lied in presenting herself as one victim against the world. But, as they say, everything has an expiry date. She was handed a strong mandate after over three decade Left rule. But, instead of breathing a fresh leadership in the state, she ended up adopting the same traits for which the people had thrown out the Left rule. Slowly, rampant corruption, political violence and cut-syndicate system (In simple words, hafta vasooli by TMC goons) became the hallmark of Trinamool government.

BJP further accused Mamata of “Muslim appeasement” especially citing the illegal infiltration from Bangladesh. Though, it is pertinent to note that border control comes under Centre and its forces, but Mamata’s meek response and downplaying of the whole issue only helped BJP further in polarising the climate. This was also in contrast to the times when Mamata, as a young MP, strongly raised the issue of Bangladeshi infiltration (when they were considered voters of Left). As both Communist Party and Congress weakened, it opened a vacuum in the opposition space, which BJP was quick enough to fill and build on. From law-and-order issue, infiltration, women safety, corruption, ‘tolabaazi’, BJP was fierce and on the face of TMC government, in their opposition role. Plus, BJP ascending to power in Centre in 2014 further helped BJP with money, muscle and institutional powers. Stopping lakhs of crores of West Bengal’s due, using Governor to disrupt the government functioning, use of agencies selectively against TMC leaders (and dropping case when same leader joined BJP) also played a key role in BJP’s rise.

However, none of these could have been enough had the Mamata government’s record been clean on other fronts. Anti-incumbency was already high over lack of jobs and stagnant industrialization. Episodes like teacher recruitment scam severely hit TMC’s credibility. The Sandeshkhali incident (where TMC’s Shahjahan Sheikh allegedly grabbed lands and raped several women) and TMC’s continued downplaying of the issue further consolidated BJP’s polarising campaign in the state. And then the RG Kar rape-murder incident in the heart of Kolkata, and its pathetic handling by the TMC government came as the last nail in the coffin. You can’t present yourself as a liberal messiah while pressurising media and arresting people for protests and social media criticism. As I said, Mamata’s rise as a leader was meteoric but her fall from grace too has been steep making her legacy similar to that of Bihar’s Lalu Yadav.

Suvendu Adhikari, Hindutva’s new poster boy who emerged giant killer twice, is BJP’s Bengal CM (Photo: ANI)

A Bengal under BJP

The seeds of Sangh ideology were actually sown in Bengal, and that’s precisely the reason why BJP always considered Bengal as its final frontier. But still till 2016, BJP had failed to win any seat in West Bengal. In 2016 elections, it opened its account with 3 seats. At that time, had someone said BJP will form the government in the state a decade later, people would have laughed like anything.vBut that’s precisely where BJP’s solid election machinery comes in. You may or may not agree with the Sangh ideology, but the sheer passion and dedication of winning every election using all means (fair and unfair), is something you have to take note of.

Suvendu Adhikari – Mamata’s former close aide, who jumped ship to BJP in 2020 – has taken oath as the first BJP Chief Minister in the state. It is, however, pertinent to note that this same leader was accused of crores worth of corruption by the same BJP. The saffron party, however, didn’t had many choices either and after Suvendu emerged giant killer by defeating Mamata not once but twice, it was bound to be him. Personally, I didn’t expect BJP and its racist-communal-misogynistic politics to take over the state which breathes the legacy of Tagore, Bose and Ray. But BJP adjusted its politics for which its key Hindutva leaders ate fish in public to show how ‘Bengali’ they are. Similar adjustments have also been seen in Goa and North-East, where BJP seems to have no issues with beef while lynching poor Muslims in other places.

Now, BJP has a state to govern which is the most uncharacteristic of its ideology. Attacks on secular-liberal fabric of the state, discrimination and polarization against minorities and deportation of those deleted from the voter list are some of the most probable scenarios going forward. With Suvendu and his team brazenly giving one hate speech after the other and openly saying that they will work only for Hindus, it’s another Himanta in making, manifesting another Assam. But, despite all this, if BJP actually goes to respect the people’s mandate, cherish Bengali culture and take on path of progress, the state I consider very close to my heart, I will be the first person to congratulate it.

Superstar ‘Thalapathy’ Vijay stormed to power in Tamil Nadu riding on his star power (Photo: Mint)

A Look at other Assembly Polls

Bengal was not the only state that went to polls, there were four more: Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Assam and Puducherry. Another major upheaval brew in Tamil Nadu, where superstar Vijay stormed to power, defeating two traditional Dravidian parties – DMK and AIADMK. I personally, based on the reports I got from ground, didn’t expect Vijay to win, but nothing could stop the Thalapathy storm this time. DMK, which actually performed very well in terms of governance and economy, was tad unlucky that Vijay chose this particular time for entering politics, otherwise they were poised to repeat power first time in their history. TVK still needed around 10 seats for majority mark, which it got from Congress and other small parties. But India’s grand old party dumping its long-standing ally DMK has already done enough damage to the Opposition unity.

Vijay carried out a very smart, subtle but a ‘aura-filled’ campaign. He used his fan clubs to take his message to the ground and used the messaging that despite getting Rs200 crore per movie, he chose to quit that life to work for the people. He made sure to portray BJP as its ideological rival but also ensured that he doesn’t look very different from the traditional Dravidian ideology of the state. Some so-called experts are claiming that people had got “bored” with traditional Dravidian politics, it’s nonsense. Vijay’s stance is same against Hindi and NEET and he idolizes Ambedkar and Periyar. So, it was not that much anti-DMK vote and more of a superstar wave, as I said. It will be very interesting to see how Vijay – a newbie in politics- is able to lead his state, while fighting against two Dravidian rivals and a Hindutva-driven strong Centre.

In Kerala, the results were pretty much on expected lines. After two consecutive terms of Communist government, the people resorted back to alternate pattern and voted for Congress. Pinarayi Vijayan – perhaps the biggest Left face since Jyoti Basu – led strongly, but after the second win in 2021, went more into personal cult and cutting down good leaders (and possible successors) which hurt the party. Going into third election with the Mr Vijayan’s face was never going to be enough in the wake of corruption allegations and high anti-incumbency. It also means that for the first time in India’s history, there is no Communist government in the country and the party, and its ideologues need to go back to the drawing board. Congress, though has returned to power in the state after a decade, it like everywhere else, will still struggle in choosing its CM. Surprisingly, BJP also managed to win 3 seats. This coming in back of BJP getting its mayor in Thiruvananthapuram few months back, should be a warning call for both Congress and Communists against a fringe but ascending saffron ideology in the state.

Assam was another state which was quite easy to predict. Considering the biased delimitation of seats, hate-filled polarisation by the Chief Minister himself, and the heavy weakening of Congress in the state, any other result would have been miracle. The way things are progressing in the state and the way communal hatred is being normalised, it will be very difficult for anyone to win back the state. Also, Himanta is fast rising among the leaders of the next-gen Hindutva poster boys.

Indian Politics Ahead: BJP at its STRONGEST, INDIA bloc in disarray

After the 2024 general elections, BJP suffered a drubbing with its numbers being reduced to 240, and it was forced to form a coalition government. The opposition INDIA bloc which won 234 seats, showed a strong promise that the Hindutva politics was weakening the country. But, what has followed is just a nightmare for the opposition. Haryana, Maharashtra, Delhi, Bihar, Bengal – BJP has just swept power as if the whole 2024 episode didn’t happen at all. More surprising has been BJP’s great show in states where it struggled in the Lok Sabha elections. It won’t be an exaggeration to say that this is the STRONGEST BJP has ever been. Yes, even more than after the 2019 general elections.

The Opposition INDIA bloc, on the other hand, looks in total disarray. Its key leaders – Arvind Kejriwal, Mamata Banerjee, MK Stalin; everyone has lost power. Few others are still fighting tough battles in their states. The bloc neither seems to have any cohesion, nor a concrete idea to stand against the Hindutva juggernaut of Modi-Shah. The road ahead looks only tougher and tougher for the opposition. However, I won’t give the whole credit to BJP and whole blame to opposition. The jackpot BJP has found in this Election Commission and their revised voter rolls, has brought the country to a position, where we can’t even say if the elections happening in the country are fair and are we even a democracy anymore. This level of dominance by an ideology driven party can never be good for any country. I won’t comment on 2029 elections now, but personally I don’t have much hope left, if the people don’t wake up.

JAI HIND & JOY BANGLA