Today’s editorial in The Hindu, “The winning formula”, begins with us being emphatically told that the BJP won despite accumulating “fatigue and popular disenchantment” over the past 5 years in 4 of the 5 states that went to the elections. Now, if there was “popular disenchantment”, then it is but natural for you to wonder how did the BJP end up winning the popular vote in the first place? To understand this, we must thank the editorial page team of The Hindu. Their editorial and articles today put forth some fascinating insights into the minds of the English language media “analysts” and “experts”.
We are told that “In Goa, the BJP retained power, though the Congress put up a spirited fight.” We are not told that the BJP retained power even after being in power for 10 years. Instead, we are told that the BJP won because it was “helped by a division of votes” and with the “strategy of selecting candidates on the basis of ‘maximum winnability’”.
We are told that “Manipur did not escape the general trend in the northeast, where people tend to vote for the party or coalition in power at the Centre since the States are dependent on Delhi for funds.” In fact, the editorial enlightens us that the Manipur election “was bereft of emotional issues, and the BJP gained from its development rhetoric.” Notice the choice of the phrase – development rhetoric – indicating that there was actually no development but there was only sweet talk related to the development and the voters of Manipur simply fell for this!
We are told that though the BJP retained power in Uttarakhand “the defeat of its Chief Minister, Pushkar Singh Dhami, is a serious embarrassment for the BJP.” I was immediately reminded of the fact that Mamta Banerjee had also lost her election while the TMC won a handsome majority in the West Bengal election just about 10 months back. The editorial in The Hindu on May 3rd doesn’t tell us that the defeat of Mamta is a “serious embarrassment” for the TMC. It still beats me how the loss of Pushkar Dhami can be a “serious embarrassment” but the loss of Mamta Banerjee is not even a normal embarrassment.
The best analysis was reserved for the biggest victory – Uttar Pradesh. In fact, there were two very long articles on the Editorial page today trying to understand how the BJP won there. The editorial tells us that the voters of UP had “appeared anguished with inflation, stray cattle menace, poor COVID-19 management, and unemployment”. You are of course left wondering why the voter would then choose the same party with which he/she is anguished with. Seema Chisti attempts to provide an answer to this in her article – Five State polls, their messages and implications.
The focus of her article is to analyse “the implications of when the voter does not factor her/his own well-being when making electoral choices.” The ease with which arrogance oozes from the pens of our “experts is simply mind-blowing! When you begin your article with an assertion that crores of people have made a choice despite knowing it is wrong, it simply exposes the vacuous depths of intellectual hollowness in your brain. The article continues its predictable rants on how bad the economy of UP is; how bad the CM Yogi Adityanath is; how bad Hindutva is and so on. The people have given a resounding response to these rants. So it is now time for Seema Chisti to be more concerned as to why she lives far away from reality and be less concerned about why voters are making their own choices.
The second article “A demonstration of a durable political phenomenon” by Asim Ali also gives a great insight into the confused minds of the “experts” and “analysts”. Asim Ali tells us that there was “economic security” but that alone didn’t win it for BJP. He tells us that there is a lot of welfare but that alone didn’t win it for BJP. Asim Ali tells us that there was better “physical security” but that alone didn’t win it for BJP. Asim Ali tells us that the major reason for this victory is because “Mr Adityanath had framed this election as an 80 versus 20 elections”. Asim Ali quotes Yogendra Yadav and concludes that voters did not bother about their own “material suffering and misgovernance because they wished to stay on their ‘own’ side”
Why would the voter be undergoing “material suffering” if he/she has economic security, physical security, welfare security etc as mentioned by the author himself? Why would all these experts and editors assume that crores of people will choose to live under harsh circumstances even at the cost of their own well-being? Simply put, why would the authors assume that crores of people in this country are as stupid as they are?
I’ve reserved their best argument for the last. We are told that “AAP, which has been in power in Delhi for seven years, has built a reputation for its welfare schemes, particularly in health and education — two sectors that voters care a lot about. That reputation stood AAP in good stead in Punjab”. They spent so much ink and space to explain that things like health, education, security, welfare etc didn’t matter to voters of 4 states that voted BJP. But to the one state that voted AAP, it was health and education that mattered. How can Malini Parthasarathy and her team not see their hypocrisy in their arguments, just with today’s examples?
Insulting the voters, for voting for the BJP, is a favourite pastime of the “experts” and “analysts” community. The editorial must be taught in journalism schools for being a perfect case study in ambiguity and hypocrisy. In fact, the entire editorial page in The Hindu serves as a great case study to understand the dangerous thought process of this whole community.
