Uttar Pradesh Assembly election: Modi now can make BJP win 2019 unless he goofs up

The Bharatiya Janata Party may have won both Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, but it's the massive victory in UP that will rank as the jewel in its crown in the current elections.

The election results not only underscores Prime Minister Modi's hold over large parts of the country's electorate, it also underlines the BJP's emergence as the preeminent pan-India party stretching out far and wide at the expense of the Congress .

In the short term, the victory in Uttar Pradesh will be seen as an endorsement of Prime Minister Modi's initiatives, including his controversial demonetisation decision.

It will also help the BJP to have a man or woman of its choice as the president and vice-president of the country, as President Pranab Mukherjee's term expires in third week of July and vice-president Hamid Ansari's term expires in August.

In the Vajpayeee era, it had managed to get Bhairon Singh Shekhawat elected as the vice-president but this will be the first time that the party will have a candidate of its choice as the next president of the country.

Bolstered by its victories, the BJP can hope to convert this into a majority in the Rajya Sabha by April next year, thereby ensuring an easy passage of its legislative agenda in both houses of Parliament.

The BJP's massive victory in Uttar Pradesh owes itself to a combination of factors, the first and foremost being prime minister Modi's hold over the electorate, his ability to carry and inspire hope amongst the electorate, and the formidable social combination that the BJP has managed to put in place in UP.

Its victory is also a big thumbs up to its strategy of building a formidable caste combination of upper castes, non-Yadav OBCs, MBCs, and the non Jatav Valmiki's amongst the Jatavs.

This was Modi's election to win or lose. Considering that the victory in Uttar Pradesh was achieved even without a chief ministerial face makes it even more significant. The results would suggest that unless he goofs-up big time between now and the 2019, general elections, he is on solid ground leading up to the next elections.

The Congress may still go on to win Goa and Manipur in addition to Punjab, however its inability to prevent the BJP from coming to power in UP is something that will hurt the Congress a lot more.

While the BJP is steadily increasing its footprint, it is also establishing itself as the country's preeminent pan-India party. The Congress on the other hand finds itself being squeezed out, and if the AAP had won Punjab it would possibly have been viewed as the main challenger to the BJP.

While the Congress party's decline did not start with Rahul Gandhi, its equally true that he has not been able to do anything to arrest the steady decline in his party's fortunes. The Congress party needs do some serious stock taking and undertake a course correction. Not only must it restructure itself, it also needs to reposition itself on both economic and national security issues.

It cannot cede the nationalist plank to the BJP, what must also worry the Congress party is that it has failed to do well in the Gandhi bastions of Amethi and Rae Bareli. In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, Smriti Irani had given Rahul Gandhi a run for his money in Amethi. Based on the results of this Assembly election, the Congress vice-president could be in for a tough time once again in 2019.

It is now abundantly clear that no political party can hope to take on the BJP juggernaut all on its own. Perhaps the answer lies in building a wide-ranging rainbow coalition.

Till that happens, the BJP can afford to sit pretty.

Also read: SP-Congress alliance was ridiculous, Prashant Kishor should take the blame

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