The Congress appeared set to form governments in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, while the contest in Madhya Pradesh remained a cliffhanger as the counting progressed. The win of Mizo National Front, which is a member of the BJP-led North East Democratic Alliance, in Mizoram was of little solace for the party, as it stared at its losses in the three states, which had in 2014 elected 62 BJP MPs of the total 65 they send to Lok Sabha.
The BJP had won 282 seats in the 543-member House in 2014 and its unprecedented triumph was powered by its near sweep of the Hindi heartland and the western states of Gujarat and Maharashtra. It barely scraped through in the Gujarat assembly polls last year, and its now poor show in the three states coupled with the likely alliance of the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party in Uttar Pradesh has made the road ahead much more difficult for the party.
A couple of BJP leaders acknowledged that the party would have to revisit its strategy and work on its messaging, while emphasising that it can be done only after these results are analysed threadbare. Results show that the BJP has fared poorly in rural regions, underlining the need for the party to challenge issues like farm distress and unemployment.
Asked if the recent amping up of the Hindutva agenda, like talks about building Ram Temple in Ayodhya and controversial remarks made by many of its leaders including UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, failed to pay off, a party leader said a conclusion can be drawn only after analysing ground reports. It will take time but the party will certainly evaluate as to what went wrong, he said on condition of anonymity.
Shah's plan of harvesting a rich tally of seats in five southern states also appears derailed as of now after the BJP came a distant third in Telangana and has shown little signs of any revival in other states, except Karnataka where it has long been a strong force. The party, politics watchers believe, would have to go back to the drawing board as its losses across the states indicate the reasons for its defeat were not local alone and had a much wider resonance.
This is also the first since the Modi led his party to its first majority government at the Centre in 2014 that the Congress has got better of the BJP in a direct contest. The BJP defeated the opposition party in assembly elections in Maharashtra, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat and emerged as the single largest party in Karnataka. A resurgent Congress and its president Rahul Gandhi are sure to keep the heat on the BJP, with these wins making them much better placed in terms of political standing and resources to take on the saffron juggernaut
BJP's poor performance in assembly polls indicates people's anger: Akhilesh Yadav
SP president Akhilesh Yadav said the BJP's poor electoral performance in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh were indicative of the people's anger against the Narendra Modi-led government. He said the results will have an impact on the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. "People have voted against the policies and programmes of the BJP...They have expressed their anger towards
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP-led states," Yadav was quoted as saying in a party release. Earlier in the day, Yadav tweeted, "Jab ek aur ek milkar bante hai gyaarah, tab badey bado ki satta ho jaati hai nau do gyaarah (when one and one come together, it makes 11, and the power of the bigwigs eventually fade away).
Uddhav Thackeray lauds voters' courage to reject "those not wanted"
Taking a swipe at BJP, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray said voters have rejected those they did not want and lauded their "courage" for showing the way forward to the country. Thackeray in a statement said, "I congratulate the courage of the voters who did not think about the useless question of who would be the choice (to the ruling parties in five states)."
"They (voters) did not think about EVMs, distribution of money, hooliganism or who would be the alternative to all of this, but rejected those they did not want. True courage is not worrying about future. The courage of voters has shown the country the way forward," he said.
Amarinder hails Congress victory; says it's beginning of end of NDA-rule
Haling the victory of the Congress in the Assembly elections in three states, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Tuesday said it was a mandate for the leadership of party President Rahul Gandhi and added that it marked the beginning of the end of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA government in the country.
"The results have clearly shown that the people of India are now fed up of the destructive and anti-development policies of the Narendra Modi government and want a positive change," Amarinder Singh said in a statement here.
Congratulating the party President, as well as UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, for the Congress win in Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, Amarinder Singh said the party had clearly revived under the dynamic leadership of Rahul Gandhi.
"The results were a sign of the mood of the nation which saw in Rahul the youthful change it needed to bring India back on the track of development, which had been the hallmark of the previous UPA regime under former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The people of India felt cheated by the failure of the Modi government to deliver on any of its promises made five years ago," Amarinder Singh said.
(With inputs from agencies)