What should BJP do to not turn into another INC?

BJP of today resembles INC of 1960s & 70s. Strong cadre, clear vision & roadmap, grassroots connectivity & above all massive trust from Indian society

Today, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is the most happening party not just in India but probably across the globe not just in terms of member strength but also in terms of growth, impact, connectivity, accessibility, national vision, people-trust & political zeal. But do these remain intact and unchanged in the long-run?

BJP's growth from 2014 through 2019 has been phenomenal and the General Elections - 2019 underscore this fact. It made significant in-roads into South, quite unexpectedly in the country youngest state i.e. Telangana with a jackpot of 4 MP seats. While BJP's emergence was accurately predicted in West Bengal & to some extent in Odisha, Telangana simply took the political analysts across the country by awe. With TRS securing 9 seats, AIMIM securing it's stronghold Hyderabad parliamentary seat, 3 of the remainder were secured by INC.

Surprisingly, BJP's vote share has increased to 19% in GE-2019 given that just in the preceding Telangana state assembly elections the party's vote share was at a mere 6% and BJP had to settle with just 1 seat in the Telangana state assembly (from 5 seats in the 2014 GE). The results were so disappointing that BJP placed little hopes for Telangana. Yet the 2019 GE results breathed new life into the party cadre. BJP is now projecting itself as a potential replacement to the ruling TRS in state given the fact that INC has lost all its credibility and people's trust ever since its 2/3rd of the Congress MLAs defected to TRS & the CLP in Telangana state Legislative council has passed a resolution seeking merger of INCLP of legislative council with TRSLP.

BJP for long has been focusing on rebranding itself as a pan-India party unlike its founders who primarily focused on north-Indian states with special attention to the hindi heartland (Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattishgarh & Uttar Pradesh). While BJP's vision is definitely laudable and commendable and is being steered in the right direction with Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi & BJP National President Shri Amit Shah at the helm of affairs, it is still not sufficient to gain bare-minimum momentum in southern states like Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu & Kerala.

Even if BJP manages to pull-off a miracle in Kerala, Tamil Nadu & Andhra Pradesh still seem out of BJP's reach because of strong dravidian sentiment coupled with anti-hindi mindset of the former and the wrath of the latter in view of BJP's betrayal on implementing bifurcation related promises.

Nevertheless, like every other great organization BJP has it's own weaknesses, and, if the party ignores these issues, they may very well cost BJP in the the long-run. Specially, if we take a look at the past, even INC has seen more success and has dominated India's political landscape for a major time. However, the party leadership's mistakes & ignorance over a generations has contributed to what they are today.

BJP should address the following (the sooner the better)

(i) Excessive-centralization of party activities – One major trend which is commonly found in political parties of a typical democratic setting is that the political party's transition calls for a strong leadership which entails centralization as an essential element of the process. However, once the transition crosses a certain phase, the magnitude & impact of centralization involving a person (or) a group of persons (or) political committees/bureaus should decrease gradually if not rapidly giving space for other organizational actors to pick-up the mantle, perform & deliver results.

In Indian politics, so far, all political parties had troubles with devolution of powers & functions to local state units and offices involving grassroots party cadre and catering to the needs, ideas, emotions and aspirations of local masses. Regardless of the vision of top leadership, local leadership and local aspirations should be tailored into the bigger picture, instead, local units have been neglected or side-lined which led to factional divisions with-in the party. BJP

(ii) Focus on reducing the impact of dynastic politics – BJP's claims of being a party that doesn't support dynasts or dynastic politicians falls flat. In 2009 the Congress and BJP had 11% and 12% dynasts elected respectively to Parliament's lower house i.e. Lok Sabha. The 15th Lok Sabha beginning in 2009 was the most dynastic legislature, comprising 53 MPs (9.5% of the total Lok Sabha MPs) with family ties to politicians. This figure reduced to 8.6% in 2014 GE, but the data show an upward trend in the proportion of dynasts occupying parliamentary seats, with almost double the proportion found in 2014 than 15 years earlier in 1994. After 2019 GE, 45 MPs (from both houses of Parliament) have been dynasts.

The definition of “dynast” for the purpose of this article is any politician whose father, mother or spouse preceded them in the Lok Sabha. The data therefore does not capture extended family relationships such as cousins or in-laws. Neither does it capture if an MP has relatives at the state assembly or Rajya Sabha-level. The figures therefore likely underestimate the actual density of political dynasties among India’s elected officials, though “between son, daughter and spouse you end up capturing more than 75% of dynastic relationships”. 

(iii) Upholding the constitutional spirit in every manner – BJP's increasing ignorance and silence towards the open threats made by certain Hindutva brigadiers who are publicly targeting minority communities using abusive language and gestures and, in some instances, violence is another serious issue.

No matter how much Hinduism and Hindutva propaganda is levelled and intensified to garner attention of Hindus and polarize the Hindu communities to reap electoral benefits, BJP must understand that these are just temporary trends. Hindus are moderates and, have, always been that. When regional political parties get stronger and come-up with a better rhetoric towards achieving developmental goals with-in the Hindu paradigm, then, people would desert BJP.

(iv) Provide a rock-solid platform for youth in real politics –  If BJP intends to survive and win elections, it should cultivate and nurture youth into active politics from local governments. At least 85% election tickets in local government elections for youth belonging to the age group of 21-30 years across the nation would strengthen party at the grassroots level including the states of Tamil Nadu & Kerala.

(v) Need to become independent of RSS & Sangh Parivar – When J.P. Nadda, the Hon'ble National President of BJP, told in an interview in May 2024 during General Elections 2024, that BJP is independent of RSS unlike earlier times when it had to rely on RSS for support, he was right. That's what political parties should do, develop and consolidate their own organizational strength and become independent of other organizations social, political or other. RSS and the constellation of Sangh Parivar are great, but they always care about their own interests and would support Indian National Congress or any other regional party if they believe that it is their interest to support such 'other political parties'. Everyone in politics know that RSS and Sangh Parivar literally rallied their support behind Rajiv Gandhi and INC in 1984 General Elections in the aftermath of Sikh Separatism and the murder of Indira Gandhi. RSS and Sangh Parivar are unpredictable.

(vi) Spiritualization of Politics – Mahatma Gandhi is among the most brilliant and unparalleled modern socio-political thinkers and philosophers of our Indian history. No matter how many attempts are made by the Hindutva Right-wing to belittle and demean our beloved Mahatma, his glory will only get more and more stronger and will reverberate across the lengths and breadths of our country and human race. Spiritualization of politics, the idea unveiled by our beloved Bapu underscores the need for politics to purify itself of the sins, stay away from committing sins and use religion and spirituality to make our people's lives better and happier on the basis of general righteousness and dharma. This, according to him, will be crucial for India being a Vishwaguru and Vishwabandhu. India i.e., Bharat is capable of removing the world's illnesses and suffering through applied spirituality that is centred around the ideas of love, kindness, trust, compassion and respect among the entire humanity. Hinduism (not Hindutva) aka Sanatana Dharma speaks essentially about these concepts and Bapu wanted INC to pioneer this project. INC did succeed to some extent before getting evaporated by 1970s. All the chest-thumping and browbeating of BJP making India a vishwaguru starts from this concept of Gandhi.