Modi fears Rahul Gandhi is taking away BJP’s Hindu vote bank

By Sushil Kutty

Prime Minister Narendra Modi took his reply to the motion of thanks to the President’s address to the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday after a day of holding forth in the Lok Sabha. The opposition sought to drown Modi’s voice in the din of constant sloganeering. The Prime Minister did not let the noise get under his skin – allow the unending interruptions to spoil his day out in the Rajya Sabha.

The Opposition on its part refused to let parliamentary decorum come in the way of the Congress’ quest to derail Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s train of thought. Underlying the Opposition’s quest was to deny the ruling party the pleasure of labeling Rahul Gandhi ‘Pappu’ – after having flogged to death this premise.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has rechristened Rahul Gandhi “Balak buddhi”, which translates to “childish behavior”. Modi takes his leader’s role seriously, but does not think that Rahul Gandhi also has the right to take his LoP role with the same seriousness.

This much was apparent on July 2 when Narendra Modi spoke in defence of the President’s address. When Rahul Gandhi delivered his maiden LoP speech and then asked journalists, “What do you think of my maiden speech, it was good, right?”

Rahul Gandhi was incredibly impressed by his own speech and perhaps Prime Minister Narendra Modi also took note that this politician wasn’t just a PM-in-waiting. On July 1, Modi was a grim figure as Rahul
Gandhi went about dismantling Hinduism brick by brick. Modi on July 2, congratulated “new BJP MPs” for a great job done. Now, after Rahul Gandhi riling Hindus with some important home truths, the BJP is working on discrediting LoP Rahul Gandhi with the obnoxious Hindu-hater tag.

Rahul Gandhi had identified BJP/RSS with ‘violence and hate’ Gandhi erred when he thoughtlessly zeroed in on Hindus as the source of all the violence visited on “the minority”. This led to protests everywhere and there are people “who call themselves Hindu”.

Modi stood up and stressed that “calling the entire Hindu society violent was a serious matter.” As long as Narendra Modi remains Prime Minister and the NDA government doesn’t topple, ‘Hindu-Muslim’ would not be going anywhere. LoP Rahul Gandhi has seen to that. This will be because, the Congress now wants to reclaim its Hindu votebank which the BJP usurped after the coming of Narendra Modi.

Rahul Gandhi does not only want the Muslim vote bank, he is also wooing the Hindu vote bank of the Bharatiya Janata Party. One might label this a little premature as 2029 is months and years ahead, but don’t forget Haryana, Jharkhand and Maharashtra would be going to polls shortly and having the Hindus on your side is half the battle won.

Prime Minister Modi has been hitting the Congress without pause and he knows the 2024 Lok Sabha election in Maharashtra had gone woefully wrong for the BJP. The Hindu votebank had deserted the BJP with Modi himself criticized for taking “Hindus for granted”. Modi has forgotten that the Hindu is basically “violent, violent and violent’ like the LoP in the Lok Sabha said. Especially after Narendra Modi took charge of India.

Modi should know that the poll verdict went against the BJP only because all of a sudden, especially after Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra, Modi was seen as a wek Prime Minister and Rahul on a rugged path was by far more aggressive – the phata-phat leader who doesn’t let his party workers down as the BJP did in the aftermath of the West Bengal assembly elections.

The Hindu is always looking for a violent resolution of contentious issues. And off late, confidence in Modi has plummeted. As long as there was Pulwama and Balakote, Modi got the votes and the verdict in his favour. But no Pulwama and Balakote and Modi is no longer “Modi hai toh mumkin hai”.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi isn’t the Superman he used to be; he who the Hindus admire. If the Hindus don’t forgive him for overlooking them while appeasing Pasmanda Muslims, the BJP will find it very hard in Haryana, Jharkhand and Maharashtra. Then there is the big one – Uttar Pradesh in 2027.
(IPA Service)