NEW DELHI: With an eye on 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP has made major changes in the organisation and is trying to stitch a rainbow coalition of various caste groups. It has appointed 10 leaders, including former heads of some state units, as members of the national executive. It has also announced election incharges for the four election- bound states of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Telengana.
Also, a meeting of NDA partners has been called on July 18 to forge unity against the Congress-led ‘Mahagathhbandan’.
The Ajit Pawar faction of the NCP and Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena group are likely to participate in this meeting. The BJP is eyeing 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra. In such a situation, the party will be keen to add the ruling Shiv Sena group to the alliance.
There are also indications that Chirag Paswan will return to the NDA fold. He had a meeting with Union Minister Nityanand Rai recently. He is also likely to attend the June 18 meeting. The move is an acknowledgement of the fact that Chirag is the sole heir of his late father and Dalit leader Ramvilas Paswan and the natural leader of Paswan community having 4.5 per cent share in Bihar’s population.
Another Dalit leader of Bihar, Jitanram Manjhi of the Hindustani Awam Morcha, has already announced his decision to return in the NDA. Talks with Om Prakash Rajbhar’s OBC party, Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party, and Mukesh Sahni of the Vikassheel Insaan Party, a party of fishermen, farmers and boatmen, are in advanced stages. Amid all this development, Chirag’s return will be a colourful coalition of upper castes, non-Yadav and non-Kurmi OBCs and Dalits. The consideration for Lok Sabha polls also seems to have influenced the party’s openness to an alliance with JD(S) which commands the allegiance of dominant caste of Vokkaligas in Karnataka.
Besides, the party is also in discussion with two of its former allies-Telugu Desam Party and Shiromani Akali Dal. The BJP feels that the expansion of the NDA at a time when the efforts of opposition parties to form a front appears to be floundering, should enhance the party’s image in the battle of perception.
