Reinterpreting Bihar’s Verdict: Part 1
- In Politics
- 10:44 AM, Nov 21, 2015
- Shashank Davanagere
Author's Acknowledgment: This article is mostly an amalgamation of thoughts put forward by an anonymous user who goes by the user name “hopewinsjunior” on various blogs and forums. I have used the arguments that s/he has put forward to form a narrative of the Bihar elections. I hope that this interpretation of data will result in learning the correct lessons for both BJP and Right Wingers, instead of incorrectly calling it a ‘debacle’ and thus altering the fundamentals of BJP.
Elections in India
Elections in India can be usually explained in terms of causes for change and the actual arithmetic that went into winning (or losing) it.
Causes for Change
As with most things in the world, when a state (or the nation) chooses to either change (or not) a particular government, the causes can be split into 80/20. That is, in 80% cases the cause is as explained below. The remaining 20% cases are the outliers which are some weird combination of these causes and something more.
There are only two issues on which strong anti-incumbency develops for a State government:
1. Corruption scandals
2. Breakdown of law & order
All the state governments that were brought down in recent times (Rajasthan, Delhi, Maharashtra, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka) were associated with high corruption (Gehlot, Dikshit, Chavan, Hooda, Soren, Yeddyurappa). The state governments that got re-elected (Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh, Orissa, and Bihar) were associated with clean chief ministers (Modi, Shivraj, Raman, Patnaik, Nitish). As for the Central Government, there are only two issues on which strong anti-incumbency develops:
1. Corruption scandals
2. Sustained high inflation
The MMS central government was brought down by high corruption and high inflation. So Modi will get re-elected for sure --AS LONG AS-- there are no corruption scandals in his central government and general inflation stays under control. All the other things like intolerance, secularism, communalism, casteism, majoritarianism, fascism, gender-discrimination, women's rights, environment, slow growth-rate, slow pace of reforms, 'exclusive versus inclusive growth' et cetera are either irrelevant or peripheral. The average Indian voter is not even remotely concerned about what left-liberal media has to say about Modi.
All Modi needs to ensure is that his government is free from corruption scandals and that inflation remains subdued in the context of healthy growth. The first part is a given because Modi has already shown that he can run a clean government. As for inflation, falling global commodity prices and the reduced revenue deficit in Jaitley's budget will automatically contain it. So all that remains is for Modi to put the economy back on 7-8% growth track. This should not be so hard, given that the next decade is going to be the 'decade of infrastructure' with investment-spending driving growth.
In other words, as far as the average Indian voter is concerned, it will be impossible to find fault with Modi's 5-years of government when he comes up for re-election in 2019. Yes, the media may go on and on with their shrill hectoring about 'rising intolerance' or 'church attacks' or whatever, but that will have No Effect whatsoever on how the average Indian voter casts his ballot. One unintended consequence of this is that, it makes Modi look like a persecuted martyr in the eyes of undecided voters, and that will help modi a lot in the next election for Prime Minister.
Now coming to the Arithmetic part of the elections.
1. The 'Voice of the People' lies in the vote-share distribution, because the people only decide who gets how many votes.
2. The 'Voice of the People' does NOT lie in the seat distribution, because the people do NOT decide who gets how many seats. The seat distribution is an artifact of the arithmetic of the first past the post system.
Any analysis which ignores or dismisses the underlying vote-shares and refers simply to the final seat distribution is bound to be completely meaningless.
It is pertinent to note here that vote share doesn’t map one-to-one in terms of seats and this is nothing new. BJP was bound to lose Bihar because the arithmetic was never in its favor. But this has always been the case since our nation was formed. It is precisely the same way that Nehru ruled for 17 years from 1947 to 1964, without ever getting more than 50% of the vote-share. The same way that Indira & Rajiv ruled for 19 years (1967-77, 1980-89), without ever getting more than 50% of the vote. The same way Sonia-MMS ruled for 10 years (2004-2014) without ever getting more than 50% of the vote.
IF, and that’s a Big IF, the whole opposition combines completely against any party, then that party will lose. This has always been true in India. There are very, very few instances in very few states in which any single party has got more than 50% of the votes. Let’s look at the past couple of LS elections. [2004 is the outlier and we’ll discuss it in a bit more detail]
CASE I: Manmohan Singh v/s Advani in 2009. What did the voters say?
(a) National Election 2004
BJP: 22%, NDA: 33% v/s Congress: 27%, UPA: 36%
(b) National Election 2009
BJP: 18%, NDA: 25% v/s Congress: 29%, UPA: 38%
CONCLUSION: The Voice of the People is crystal clear. They have COMPLETELY rejected Advani (vote-share collapsed from 22% to 18%) and have expressed continuing faith in Manmohan Singh (vote-share rose from 27% to 29%).
CASE II: Modi v/s Rahul Gandhi in 2014. What did the voters say?
(a) National Election 2009
BJP: 18%, NDA: 25% v/s Congress: 29%, UPA: 38%
(b) National Election 2014
BJP: 31%, NDA: 39% v/s Congress: 19%, UPA: 23%
CONCLUSION: The Voice of the People is crystal clear. They have completely rejected Rahul Gandhi (vote-share collapsed from 29% to 19%) and have expressed support for Modi (vote-share rose from 18% to 31%).
Now coming to the 2004 elections.
CASE III: Vajpayee v/s Sonia in 2004. What did the voters say?
(a) National Election 1999
BJP: 24%, NDA: 37% v/s Congress: 28%, UPA: 33%
(b) National Election 2004
BJP: 22%, NDA: 33% v/s Congress: 26%, UPA: 35%
CONCLUSION: The Voice of the People is not clear. BJP & Congress have both dropped 2% vote-share. However, while NDA has dropped 4% vote-share, UPA has gained 2% vote-share. Therefore, the UPA won this election because they had better alliances.
To understand what happened in 2004, we have to look at the results for the Communist parties. Despite getting the same vote-share as they did in 1999, the Communist parties vastly increased their seat-tally. They managed to do this because of a seat-sharing arrangement they had with the Congress & UPA. They agreed to withdraw their candidates in seats where the Congress/UPA stood a good chance, and the Congress/UPA agreed to withdraw their candidates in seats where the Communist parties were strong. This was especially a swing factor in Andhra Pradesh and was responsible for wiping out Chandra Babu Naidu's TDP (NDA) and handing over those seats to the UPA (Congress, TRS) and Communist parties.
So why the Communist did parties show this sudden zeal to work with Congress and bring as many parties as possible into the UPA in 2004? The answer is that the Communist parties were alarmed by Arun Shourie's privatization drive and were determined to throw out the BJP at any cost. I suspect that Advani & Vajpayee were so confident that the Communists were history that they did not take them seriously and so let Shourie have his way over privatization. This was a fatal error. This enraged & energized the Communist parties so much that they began to move heaven and earth to defeat the BJP. It was the hard work done by the Communist parties that really managed to increase the seats of the UPA & the Communist parties themselves by optimizing alliances. This was possible only because Communists like BJP are a cadre based parties, so have people on ground rooted in their ideologies.
In effect 2004 was really a victory for the Communist Parties. The defeat for the BJP was not caused by corruption or inflation, but by a broad alliance optimized against the BJP on the initiative of the Communists. Note that Modi understands these reasons for the 2004 defeat of the BJP thoroughly. This is why he (a) is in no mood to repeat Arun Shourie’s political mistake of wholesale privatization, and, (b) refuses to ask for votes on issues on which he does not intend to (or can't) deliver. And this aspect is something which he has always stood by in Gujarat as well. He only promised what he can deliver and made sure that he delivered on all the things he promised. Modi is not going to repeat the mistakes of Vajpayee, Advani & Shourie. Modi has promised honest government, contained inflation and good growth with jobs. And that is exactly what he intends to deliver.
Vote shares in Bihar and what it tells us
In my opinion, the analyses of the Bihar election that are being reported in the media are grossly incorrect. Yes, it is correct that the Mahaghatbandhan [MGB] has won more seats due to vote-pooling than the BJP. However, the real winner (i.e. in a long-term sense) is the BJP. Let’s look at RJD, JDU, Congress & BJPs vote share in past 3 elections.
RJD Track-record—
2010: Seats contested 168, Vote-share: 18%
2014: Seats contested 164, Vote-share: 18% (national)
2015: Seats contested 101, Vote-share: 18%
JDU Track-record—
2010: Seats contested 141, Vote-share: 23%
2014: Seats contested 230, Vote-share: 16% (national)
2015: Seats contested 101, Vote-share: 16%
Congress Track-record—
2010: Seats contested 243, Vote-share: 8%
2014: Seats contested 79, Vote-share: 8% (national)
2015: Seats contested 41, Vote-share: 7%
BJP Track-record—
2010: Seats contested 102, Vote-share: 16%
2014: Seats contested 182, Vote-share: 29% (national)
2015: Seats contested 159, Vote-share: 25%
Rearranging the vote shares we can see:
2010 Bihar state-assembly elections:
(a) BJP: 16% (b) JDU: 23% (c) RJD: 18% (d) Congress: 8%
2014 national elections in Bihar:
(a) BJP: 29% (b) JDU: 16% (c) RJD: 18% (d) Congress: 8%
So from where did BJP get the extra 13% of the votes in 2014? Clearly, since RJD & Congress voters will not vote for BJP, it logically follows that BJP got an extra 7% because some JDU voters moved to the BJP during the 2014 national elections AND it also got an additional 6% because some of the floating voters (non-JDU, non-Congress, non-RJD) moved towards the BJP during the 2014 national elections.
The pundit-consensus in 2014 was that the 7% JDU voters who had moved to the BJP to elect Modi as PM and would MOVE BACK to JDU to elect Nitish as CM during the 2015 state-election. In addition, it was also predicted that the popularity of Nitish as CM would even attract some of the floating voters to the JDP during the state-elections. Has this proven correct?
2015 state-assembly elections:
(a) BJP: 25% (b) JDU: 16% (c) RJD: 18% (d) Congress: 7%
Clearly, the 7% JDU voters who had moved to the BJP during the 2014 national elections have moved PERMANENTLY to the BJP. Even with Nitish as CM-candidate, the JDU vote-share has remained the same as it was in the 2014 national election. The only logical reason for this is that Nitish's alliance with Lalu HAS REPELLED those JDU voters and they have now become a permanent-part of the BJP vote-base. This is the KEY story being missed by the media.
Of the other 6% of floating voters who had moved to the BJP in the 2014 national elections have, 4% have moved back to others (independents & small parties), and this is the ONLY reason for the fall in BJP vote-share from the national election in 2014 to the state-election in 2015.
Even so, note that for the first time in the history of Bihar state-elections, the BJP has now the highest number of voters by far. BJP has made HISTORY in this election. This is another key story being missed by the media. Its vote-share in Bihar is now at a historically unprecedented 25%. Given that BJP started out as a small-time bit-player in Bihar, this is a tectonic shift that has now put the BJP into pole position in Bihari politics. Here are the data for BJP vote-shares in Bihar state-elections from 1951 to present:
YEAR: BJP vote-share in Bihar state-election
1951: 1% (Jan Sangh)
1957: 1% (Jan Sangh)
1962: 3% (Jan Sangh)
1967: 11% (Jan Sangh)
1969: 15% (Jan Sangh)
1972: 12% (Jan Sangh)
1977: 12% (as part of Janata Party)
1980: 9%
1985: 8%
1990: 12%
1995: 13%
2000: 15%
2005: 15%
2010: 16%
2015: 25% <---- SPECTACULAR PERFORMANCE.
Implications for the future
If Nitish is unable to keep Lalu's associates under control and the law & order situation in Bihar deteriorates over the next few years, even more of Nitish's non-Kurmi, non-Muslim (i.e. EBC & SC) voters would leave the JDU gravitate toward the BJP. All the BJP needs is to get another 4-5% from the JDU and then the NDA (BJP plus the smaller SC-OBC parties) will be able sweep the next election by roundly defeating the MGB (RJD, Congress & JDU).
The media pundits needs to THINK about these underlying trends in the collapse of the JDU vote-base (from 23% to 16%) and the rise of the BJP vote-base (from 16% to 25%), with the RJD and Congress vote-bases remaining approximately constant (at 18% and 7% respectively). The superficial analyses we see these days of pundits simply looking at the number of seats that JDU has won in this election lack insight.
Also we have to remember that the Bihar formula is very difficult to repeat elsewhere [And we will look at this in detail vis-à-vis UP in a bit]. For example, SP, Congress & RLD may well combine to form a Grand Alliance in UP, but Mayawati BSP will never join them because her core voters are inherently anti-SP. In Orissa, Patnaik can be brought down if BJP and Congress form an alliance, but that is never going to happen because BJP-core voters are inherently anti-congress. In Bengal, Mamta can be brought down if BJP and the communists form an alliance, but that is never going to happen because BJP voters are inherently anti-communist.
It is very difficult to get the whole opposition together. Even when it does come together against a particular party, the inherent contradictions of any such alliance usually leads to chaos, breakdown and eventual collapse of the arrangement. This is what we saw with the JP alliance of 1977-80 (Desai v/s Charan Singh fight), the LD alliance of 1989-1992 (VP Singh v/s Chandrasekhar fight), and the Third Front alliance of 1996-98 (Gujral v/s Gowda fight). And this is EXACTLY what we will see with this new Grand Alliance in Bihar (Lalu v/s Nitish fight).
Comments