Jharkhand 2014 - Another milestone for the BJP juggernaut

The assembly elections in Jharkhand and Jammu & Kashmir were the last pitstop in the political calendar of what has been an eventful year. In the context of Indian politics 2014 has undoubtedly been the year of the BJP juggernaut. The BJP entered 2014, high on the victories of the December 2013 Vidhan Sabha elections and as the year progressed the BJP juggernaut rolled on, feeding on the discontent with a decade of Congress rule, gaining momentum and reaching a crescendo in the campaign for the Lok Sabha elections. The verdict of 2014 was a landmark one in more ways than one(as discussed previously on this blog). It was the first time in nearly 30 years that a single party was able to win a simple majority and marked historical highs for the BJP, historical lows for the Congress. As Narendra Modi took over the reigns of the nation, his trusted lieutenant Amit Shah became the BJP party president and under the leadership of this gujarati duo, the BJP has acquired a new kind aggression and business like organization. It became evident in the assembly elections in Maharashtra and Haryana where the BJP refused to play second fiddle to alliance partners, fought elections on their own and managed to form governments in both states. Jharkhand is another milestone in what has been an extraordinary year for the BJP. The BJP is back to power in Jharkhand making it the 6th state they have won in the last 12 months apart from the national elections. 

The juggernaut is still rolling, but a closer look at the data from the results seems to suggest that it might be losing some steam. The rest of this post is about dissecting the results of Jharkhand  2014 in the context of previous assembly elections and the national elections 7 months ago to understand how heartland politics is evolving. Like always we start with a quick graphical summary of the result of Jharkhand assembly election of 2014 (below).

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The BJP with its pre-poll ally the AJSU got to a simple majority winning 42 (37+5) of the 81 seats in the house. The Jhadrkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) came second with 19 seats to emerge as the principal opposition party in the state. Babulal Marandi's outfit JVM(P) came third while the Congress-RJD-JD(U) grand alliance was relegated to fourth place. 

The next graphic (below) takes a deeper look at the result of the election by region(more on the regions in Jharkhand here), and by constituency type (General, Schedule caste, Schedule Tribe)

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We can see in this graphic that though powered by strong performances in the Hazaribagh (North Chhotanagpur) and the Ranchi (South Chhotanagpur) regions the BJP did reasonably well across regions. It emerged with the most number of seats even in the traditional JMM stronghold of Santhal Pargana and Kolhan (Chaibasa division) was the only region it came second to the JMM. On the other hand the JMM returned good performances from its traditional stronghold of Santhal Parganas as well as Kolhan. Also though the BJP did very well in the General category seats, it did even better in the SC reserved seats and ran the JMM neck to neck in the ST reserved seats. 

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We next try to to look at the Jharkhand assembly elections in the context of previous assembly elections (graphic above). Though still a multi-cornered contests the vote shares are more spread out compared to previous elections. This election marks historic highs for both the BJP and the JMM, in terms of vote shares as well as seats. At 31% the BJP's voteshare is a good 5% higher than the highest vote share it has ever achieved. The same is true for the JMM, at ~ 20% it is 5% higher than the highest vote share it has ever achieved. On the other hand the Congress and the Janta parties are at historic lows in terms of vote shares as well as seats in spite of their grand alliance. Lastly the indipendents and others grouping, has also gone down for the second election in a row after the Madhu Koda years where a group of 5 independents literally held the state politics at ransom. Altogether it seems that the Jharkhand polity is moving towards a more consolidated mandate after years of failed experiments at coalitions.

Moving on, It must be noted that the result of the Jharkhand elections wasn't exactly around expected lines. A majority of the opinion polls had predicted the BJP to reach a majority on their own, and some had even predicted a complete sweep. In that context the BJP victory, was not all that comfortable, in an election where they were expected to canter across the finish line, they literally made it there on all fours. 

Few of the opinion polls were possibly influenced by the results of the Lok sabha elections in May 2014 where the BJP won 56 of the 81 assembly segments on their own. Evidently a lot changed in the intervening 7 months and it is hence useful to drill deeper to compare the results of the Vidhan Sabha elections in December with the Lok Sabha elections in May. 

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The graphic above shows a comparison between May 2014 (LS) and Dec 2014(VS). National elections are different from state elections in the sense that the issues and personalities involved are different. Also while the BJP might have benefited from anti-incumbency in the national elections that factor would probably work against it in Jharkhand, having ruled the state almost 10 of its 14 years of existence. Still this is not a very flattering graphic for a BJP supporter. 

A lot has been talked about BJP's slide in Kolhan, primarily owing to the shock defeat of former chief Minister Arjun Munda from the BJP stronghold of Kharsawan. However it has to be kept in mind that Kolhan is not the only under performer for the BJP. When compared to the May Lok Sabha elections the BJP has lost segments in almost all regions barring Santhal Pargana where they managed to retain their tally. 

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The comparison in vote shares between May and December (graphic above) provides further evidence of erosion of the BJP's support over these two elections. As we can see between May and December the BJP+ formation's vote share fell by a whopping 8.8%. Once again as we saw in the previous graphic the vote share has dipped in all regions. However it is the fall in vote share in the Palamau and the Hazaribagh regions that should concern the BJP the most. Between May and December the BJP+ voteshare from Palamau fell from close to 47% to a very modest 25.5% which is a fall of more than 22.5%.  The fall in BJP voteshare is reflected in its seat tally from this regions. While they had won 9 out of 9 segments from Palamau in May, that number came down to 4/9 in December. The story is not very different for the Hazaribagh division where the BJP lost close to 12% in voteshare compared to LS 2014.

Now Palamau is an interesting region. Firstly it shares its borders with southern Bihar and Eastern UP and the cultural and political milieu of the region is contiguous to them. Bhawanathpur, the northernmost constituency of Palamau, is barely 200 kms from Varanasi- Narendra Modi's constituency and the epicenter of the Modi wave in eastern India. Secondly, along with the Hazaribagh division, it is perhaps the area in Jharkhand which is least tribal in character. There is only one ST reserved seat between the 34 segments that that comprise the two divisions. What all of this means is that if one were looking for a region in Jharkhand which is most representative of what is called the 'hindi heartland' then the Palamu Hazaribagh region would come closest. That is why understanding the reasons behind the massive fall in vote share for the BJP between May and December 2014 in these two regions becomes important. The impending assembly elections in neighboring Bihar and formation of the grand alliance between INC, RJD and JD(U) only makes it more interesting. 

Many reasons could be proffered for the dip in BJP vote share across Jharkhand and the very significant dip in the Palamau and Hazaribagh region. Was it because of the lack of credible leadership at the state level? Is the central governments honeymoon period over? Is this verdict an assessment of the performance of Narendra Modi as prime minister? Is it a verdict against the the perceived resurgence in hindu fundamentalist forces, the gharwaapsis and the love Jihad non-issues? Or is it the grand Congress-RJD-JD(U) coming good?

The last possibility is most easily dealt with. Both the Palamau and the Hazaribagh regions have traditionally been regions where the Congress and Janta have been strong. One would have thought that together they would have made a significant force, at least in these two regions but that's not really the case. However, The BJP's loss in vote share has not really gone to the Congress-Janta formation. In reality their vote share went up by less than a percent in Hazaribagh, and went down by a few percentage points in Palamau (compared to May 2014). An unimpressive performance netting them a grand total of 3/35 seats in the two regions where they would have fancied their chances.  The alliance execution also left a lot to be desired. In as many as 10 constituencies the alliance had multiple candidates and they could have won at least 2 more seats (Chhatarpur and Manika) had they fought better together. Even from the longer term perspective the vote shares of the Congress as well as the Janta parties are at historic lows in this region, grand alliance or not.

The lack of credible leadership for the BJP in Jharkhand cannot be ruled out as a cause of the dip in vote share between May and December. Jharkhand's short history of 14 years has been a sad tragicomedy of the failure of democracy and everyone including the BJP has played a part. If anything the Jharkhand verdict of 2014 has been a verdict against the traditional politics. All the former chief ministers who fought this election had a tough outing. Hemant Soren, the incumbent Chief Minister from JMM lost from the stronghold of Dumka but was saved the blushes by winning from Barhait, another JMM stronghold where the JMM has won all of the last 5 elections. Babulal Marandi, the first chief minister of the state and the face of JVM(P) lost from Dhanwar and Madhu Koda lost from Majhgaon. The biggest shocker though was the defeat of Arjun Munda another ex-chief minister and potential candidate for the top job from Kharsawan, another BJP bastion where they have won 4 of the last 5 elections and where they won by a whopping margin of close to 50,000 votes in the Lok Sabha elections just 7 months ago. There couldn't be a clearer signal from the voters on what they think of the existing state leadership, across party lines. 

It is also instructive to check where the vote share that the BJP lost landed up. In the case of both Palamau and Hazaribagh regions the vote share lost by the BJP landed up primarily with the JMM and Independents/others. This has to be taken with the fact that the JMM wasn't even fighting in most of the assembly segments in the May elections, being given a measly 4/14 seats by the Congress in the UPA seat sharing agreement for Jharhand. Among the others who gained vote share in Palamau the BSP is prominent ending up winning their first seat ever in the Jharkhand assembly. One seat was won by sitting health minister Bhanu Pratap Shahi of the Naujawan Sangharsh Morcha.

To sum up the discussion about Jharkhand 2014, it is indeed another good victory for the BJP to cap what has been a great year for them. They managed to cross the line but only just and and the loss of vote share between May and December at close to 8% in the state (and as much as 20% in Palamau) is too big to ignore. The lack of credible leadership at the state level has most certainly been a factor, but the election does show that even 'tectonic shifts' are not permanent and every wave, even the Modi wave has a shelf life. For the Congress the slide continues and the results from Palamau show that just getting the alliance together is not enough, the key is still in the execution. Finally while the balance in BJP's alliances with regional parties is shifting towards the BJP it is moving the other way for congress alliances.  The inability of the Congress to retain its alliance with the JMM might have been a big factor in this election and it would do well to be more realistic going into Bihar.

Jharkhand 2014 is BJP's to lose

Polling was completed for all the assembly segments of Jharkhand yesterday. In all the state recorded a turnout of  66 % which is much better than the  57% turnout in the last assembly elections and even marginally better than the impressive 64 % turnout in the 2014 Lok Sabha Elections. 

In this post the intention is to analyze in greater detail the results from elections in Jharkhand and to understand what implications it has in the context of this election. The term 'past elections' needs a further elaboration here. As detailed out in the last post - even though as a state, Jharkhand has had only 2 assembly elections (2005, 2009), its first Assembly was derived from the Bihar Assembly election of 2000. Similarly as detailed earlier, the movement for a separate state in Jharkhand is an old one and the regions of south Bihar, now constituting Jharkhand have long demonstrated an electoral proclivity slightly different from the rest of Bihar. Hence the decision to go further back and include the results from assembly elections in the constituencies that now compromise Jharkhand (but before 2000 were a part of Bihar) as far back as 1977 in the analysis.  Lastly the most significant data we have is the data from the Lok Sabha election of 2014. The election commision of India provides detailed data at the Assembly constituency (and even the Polling booth) level in what is called the Form 20. This analysis also includes consolidated form 20 data from jharkhand from the 2014 elections. It may even be useful to start from here, given that it was only 6 months ago and even though national elections and state elections are different, it can tell us a few things about how Jharkhand 2014 is likely to turn out. 

In this post I will start with analyzing data from Jharkhand elections over the last 4 decades to understand what it might imply for 2014. Also i will try take a more detailed look at the  2014 form 20 data, in the context of past elections, to come up with some hypotheses on what might happen in this assembly election. To start with lets take a look at a graphical representation of vote shares and seats won over the set of 9 elections that we picked as described in the previous paragraph.

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The first thing that gets evident about the politics of this state/region from this graphic is its highly fragmented nature. Throughout elections in the last two decades much of Jharkhand has witnessed a four cornered contest between the BJP, the Congress, the Janta parties and the Jharkhand parties. Also throughout this period the multi-cornered contests have led to bitterly divided mandates. The assembly elections of 2000 was the only time that one party or formation came decisively close to a clear majority. As we saw in the last post that was the verdict that ultimately led to the creation of Jharkhand and the formation of the first BJP government with the support of the JD(U).

In terms of the leadership position in this fragmented polity this has almost exclusively belonged to the BJP through the last 4 elections, both in terms of vote shares and seat won. Bihar in 1980 was one of the first election the BJP fought as a party and ever since then its support for statehood, tribal outreach (through the vanvasi kalyan kendras) and the divisive Ram temple aggitation has brought it to the forefront of the fragmented politics of Jharkhand, a position it has largely retained. Also worth noting is that the maximum the JMM has ever achieved in terms of vote share is around 17% and the maximum number of seats it has ever won is 18.

Also the Congress and the Janta parties are forces that is evidently on the wane in this region. The Congress did bounce back marginally in 2009 on the strength of its alliance with JVM but the fact that its vote share shrunk in 2014, in spite of contesting on 10 of the 14 seats in the alliance with the JMM, seems to confirm its steady slide. Given how it stands the prospects of the Congress-Janta  alliance in this election would seem bleak but that is something we would get back to. 

Thirdly, what becomes evident is the fragmented nature of 'Jharkhandi' politics itelf. Over the years even though the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) has been the most prominent Jharkhand Regional party, there have been other Jharkhand regional parties like the All Jharkhand Students Union(AJSU) that have been around. The ones that have gained in strength most recently being the JVM (led by Marandi) and the JBSP (Madhu Kora's Party). An interesting factoid is that between the assembly elections of 2009 and the parliamentary elections of 2014, where the BJP made a decisive surge, the JVM was the only other party that registered an increase in vote share (despite the fact that it was a national election and the JVM a regional party)

Also worth mentioning is the lesser known fact that the extreme left still retains political influence in parts of Jharkhand. The CPI(ML)(L) has strongholds in Giridih, Kodarma where it routinely wins elections.

Lastly the Independents block, which has been significant block in Jharkhand,  seems to be loosing traction,  in what can only be seen as a welcome sign following the Koda years. 

With that we move on to a map collage view of the 9 elections in our consideration set. just to give an idea of who has been winning where. 

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The areas of influence of various political formations become more evident from this graphic. As we can see the JMM has been routinely winning elections in the largely tribal north eastern areas of Santhal Parganas division and southern parts of Kolhan and Ranchi Divisions. On the other hand the influence of the Janta parties has been most pronounced in the regions bordering bihar i.e. the Palamau and Hazaribagh divisions. The Congress seems to be strongest in the Ranchi and the Palamau divisions but as we saw earlier its influence even there has been on the decline. The BJP seems to be the only party which has won in divisions across the state.  This will become even more evident in the following graphic as we try to identify strongholds for various parties .i.e. based on the number of times in the last 6 elections that a party has won from a seat, the darker shade, the more the number of wins.

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This again reaffirms, that the JMM is primarily strong in the tribal areas of Santhal Parganas, Chaibasa and Ranchi Divisions. It has never won a seat in the Palamau division and large parts of the Hazaribagh and Ranchi divisions. Similarly the Janta parties (JD, RJD, JD(U) et al, are primarily strong in the palamu division and the Hazaribagh division (bordering Bihar) and has practically won nothing in the rest of the state. The congress has been traditonally strong in the Ranchi division, which has produced leaders likeformer union minister Subodh Kant Sahai, but not much else where, and even there its influence seems to be on the wane. The BJP seems to be the only party to have won consistently across the state, with major urban strongholds like Jamshedpur, Kanke and Dhanbad where it has never lost in the last 5 elections.

We finally move on to take a deeper look at the results of the 2014 lok sabha elections and using this and the context of the previous elections extrapolate what may happen in the results tomorrow. The graphic below shows Jharkhand form 20 data from the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. 

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Like much of the northern part of the country the BJP literally swept Jharkhand - winning 12 of the 14 parliamentary constituencies. The remaining two being won by the JMM in its Santhal Pargana strongholds of Rajmahal and Dumka. In Jharkhand the BJP garnered a vote share of 40%, A good lead of 17% over the closest competing coalition (Congress +JMM) which together managed to garner barely 23%.Even looking at the Assembly constituency level from Form 20 data, the BJP did quiet impressively leading in 56 of the 81 Assembly constituencies. The JMM came next leading in 9 constituencies, but considering that it contested in only 4 of the 14 Lok Sabha Constituencies (i.e 22 of the 81 Vidhan sabha constituencies) its performance is not as bad as it looks. Much like the rest of India the Congress was routed in Jharkhand leading in only 3 out of the 51 constituencies it contested. There are a few surprises in the others box as well. If the BSP can repeat its performance in Khunti LS constituency where its candidate Subodh Purty gave a stiff challenge to BJP veteran Karia Munda in the Lok Sabha polls, there is a good chance that they would open their account in Jharkhand for the first time. Geeta Kora, wife of former chief minister Madhu Koda and JBSP contestant also performed credibly in Singhbhum leading in 3 assemblies. CPI(ML)(L) led in 3 segments of the Kodarma parliamentary constituency, long considered a left stronghold.

There have been some pronounced changes in the alliance arithmetic since May 2014. The Congress and JMM which fought the lok sabha elections together are no longer allies. The remaining constituents of the UPA - Congress and RJD have now been joined by the JD(U). Meanwhile BJP has secured the support of All Jharkhand Students Union(AJSU) and the JVM has allied with the Trinamul Congress (AITC). 

Also the issues involved in a state election are very different from National elections. For starters while BJP had anti incumbency going for it 6 months ago, it may not be so in this election, the BJP having ruled (and many believe not very well) Jharkhand for close to 10 of its 14 years of existence. Secondly unlike the national election the state BJP does not have a strong leader as chief ministerial candidate. Lastly the Modi wave itself cannot sustain forever and has to wane. 

However no other party/combination seems to be well positioned to significantly counter the BJP. As we saw earlier the JMM has limitations in terms of geographical reach. In reality calling it an pan Jharkhand party could be a stretch. The Congress+RJD+JD(U) grand alliance showed its promise in the Bihar by elections, and could have been a force to reckon with, at least in the areas bordering Bihar, primarily in the Palamau and Hazaribagh divisions, but it is in the execution that this alliance has failed. In close to 10 constituencies, these parties are fighting against one another, and not surprisingly most of these 10 are in the two aforementioned divisions where they would have stood a chance had they fought together. Lastly the JVM shows promise and could be the wildcard. Marandi is still recognized as an honest leader and even in the 2014 wave election, the JVM still managed to increase its vote share, vis-a-vis 2009, when it was fighting in alliance with the Congress. The problem is that given the size of their base even a 5% jump in vote share does not make a significant dent. 

Finally, given the magnitude of the BJP's performance six months ago, and given they won almost 2/3 of the assembly constituencies against a united opposition of Congress+JMM (now fighting separately) this election is the BJP's to lose and the looking at the 2014 Lok Sabha result they should canter home to at least a simple majority. In that context the BJP's 'Mission 42' is really somewhat of an oxymoron (aren't missions meant to be aspirational, and why would someone aspire for a simple majority, when they are just coming out of an election where they won 2/3). If anything it highlights the diffidence of the BJP state leadership. Indeed the BJP getting any less than 45 seats in this election (though very unlikely) would be a damning verdict against them. 

The story of Jharkhand in numbers

The history of assertion of tribal identity in the Chhotanagpur region is an old one, dating as far back to the tribal revolts of the 18th and the 19th century. The Santhal rebellion led by the brothers Sidhu and Kanu between 1855-60 and the Birsa Munda revolt between 1895-2000 were two of the most prominent of these. In the early 20th century, the movement for tribal identity and rights took a turn towards moderate politics and a demand for the creation of a separate state of Jharkhand was first submitted to the Simon commission in 1929. The creation of the Jharkhand party under the leadership of Jaipal Singh Munda (oxford educated former captain of Olympic gold winning India hockey team) roughly around the time of India's independence was an important milestone in this movement. Under the charismatic leadership of Jaipal Singh, the Jharkhand party was able to expand its base to include a significant section of non-tribals and performed well in the first two elections (1952,1957) to the Bihar assembly, winning 32 seats each time to become the principal opposition party in Bihar. however with the state reorganization commission rejecting the demand of a separate state of Jharkhand on linguistic ground the movement lost some steam in the 60's ultimately culminating with Jaipal Singh himself defecting to the Congress and the movement splitting into several splinter groups. 

The movement for a separate state of Jharkhand was injected with a fresh energy in the late 70's with the formation of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha under the leadership of Shibu Soren and the All Jharkhand Students Union under the leadership of Surya Singh Besra. The 80's and 90's were also characterized by an element of radicalism in the Jharkhand movement, with innumerable 'bandhs' and economic blockades. Meanwhile the BJP the new entrant to the scene also threw its weight behind the creation of a separate state, Vananchal, as it preferred to call it. 

Though the original demand had been of a 'greater Jharkhand' comprising of parts of West Bengal and Orissa, it is in Bihar that this movement created the maximum political impact. Through the 90's Laloo Yadav's JD/RJD kept doing well in the northern parts of the state, but not so well in the south where proponents of a separate state (the Jharkhand parties and the BJP) kept doing better. The elections to the Bihar Assembly between 1990 and 2000 kept throwing up fractured verdicts reflecting this chasm as can be seen in the figure below.

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When Laloo Yadav first came to power in Bihar riding on the Mandal wave in 1990 to occupy the chair that his mentor Karpuri Thakur had once did with the support of the JMM among others. Even in the elections in 1995, his party dint do too well in southern Bihar but still came close to a clear majority based on a strong performance in the north. It was in this time that  the Jharkhand Area Autonomous Committee (JAAC) under the chairmanship of Shibu Soren was formed in what some saw as a compromise formula and a step towards full statehood while others saw as a blatant sellout. 

Almost all of Bihars mineral resources and a bulk of its heavy industries was concentrated in the southern part of the state. Given that Jharkhand if formed would take with it the lions share of the states revenues there was obviously a great deal of resistance in what would remain of Bihar to the idea of a new state. 

In the assembly elections of 2000 Laloo Yadav made the bifurcation of the state a key issue and ultimately it was the the result of this election  that that sealed the case for the creation of Jharkhand. The election threw up a hung assembly and meant that ruling over divided Bihar was Laloo Yadav's  best case scenario. With a BJP government (which had long declared its support for a separate state) at the center the Bihar reorganization Act was finally passed in 2000 with the support of both the Congress and the RJD and the new state of Jharkhand was born. The graphic below shows the constitution of the first Jharkhand assembly.

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With 40 Seats and the support of independents the NDA formed the first government of Jharkhand under the leadership of Babulal Marandi. The new chief minister was widely acknowledged for is integrity, simple background as school teacher as well as the architect of various schemes to get the new state started. However one controversial move, with the Jharkhand Domicile Act, proved to be his undoing. Ostensibly created with the intent to strengthen the rights of tribals in their new homeland, the act that was perceived as against the rights of non-tribals in the state and was received with a lot of criticism and even some violence. Ultimately under pressure from alliance partners like the JD(U) Marandi was forced to quit in favor of Arjun Munda, barely 2.5 years into his term. 

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The graphic above shows the constitution of the second assembly of Jharkhand elected post the 2005 elections. The election threw up a hung assembly with the pre-election formations NDA(36) and UPA(33) running neck to neck. Shibu Soren(JMM) was invited by the governor - Syed Sibte Razi to form the government, inspite of the norm being to invite the leader of the largest pre-election formation. His government lasted a mere 10 days as he failed to garner the numbers and Arjun Munda (BJP/NDA) again became the CM with support from the block of 5 independent/other MLAs after protracted negotiations leading to plum ministerial posts for the independents. One of them Madhu Koda was appointed as Minister of Mining. 

Arjun Munda's second stint was again not meant to last - after merely a year and a half the block of independents withdrew support leading to his resignation. A ramshackle (UPA) coallition was again formed and the block of 5 independents were able to extract their pound of flesh. Madhu Koda, an independent MLA became Jharkhands 4th chief minister leading a ministry with representatives from JMM, RJD, NCP, FB and 3 indipendent MLA's with outside support from the INC.  

Barely 2 years into Madhu Koda's tenure, and after he had been asked to quit as union minister by Manmohan singh following a Dehi high court conviction, Shibu Soren made another desperate attempt for the post he had aspired for his entire life. The JMM withdrew support, Koda was forced to resign and relegated to the meaningless position of UPA while Shibu Soren became chief minister for the second time. 


Guruji (as the elder Soren is called) finally got his chair but fate had other ideas. He lost the assembly by-election in the JMM stronghold of Tamar, and having failed to enter the assembly was forced to resign barely 144 days into his second stint. The state was thrown back into presidents rule and thus ended what could arguably be called the most farcical phase in the short history of the state or so it seemed at that time, but more was to follow.

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If 2005 had thrown up a divided mandate, 2009 took it one step further. The graphic above shows the constitution of the mandate of the 2009 assembly elections. While the polity of jharkhand was trundling between 2005 to 2009 elections, Babulal Marandi had managed to keep his distance from the state BJP and the series of crises. In the 2004 elections he fought the elections from Koderma and was the only BJP contestant (among 14) to win. In 2006 he finally bit the bullet, quit the BJP and formed his own party the Jharkhand Vikas Morcha (JVM). The Congress which was desperate to repair its image after the part that it (and its appointed governor) played in the previous assembly allied with 'the clean' Babulal Marandi's JVM. The result was a 3 way contest between the BJP-JD(U), JMM and the Congress-JVM, and another hung assembly

Again Shibu Soren made a play for power and this time the BJP came in to provide support before pulling out in 5 months, leading to another 3 month period of presidential rule. The BJP and JMM then agreed to (some) power sharing agreement with Arjun Munda becoming the chief minister and Hemant Soren as deputy CM. The details of what happened next are sketchy but by some accounts, the JMM wanted a rotation in chief ministership to which the BJP did not agree. As a result the JMM pulled the plug on the BJP government and finally after another period of Presidents rule Hemant Soren again became the chief minister of Jharkhand (now with Congress support) and remains to this day.

So that is the story of the this young state. It is the story of the lust for power reducing democracy in Jharkhand to being the theatre of the absurd and nearly every principal actor in the arena is guilty of playing their part. All this while Jharkhand has remained one of the most underdeveloped states in India. Twenty one of its twenty four districts still count among the most underdeveloped in the country. One cant miss the irony that Bihar whose 'clutches' the Jharkhand movement so dearly fought to escape has done much better in the last 10 years under the stable leadership of Nitish Kumar.  Lastly the democratic process is supposed to offer hope (and a safety valve) to those living in the most wretched of conditions, but in Jharkhand its failure has only strengthened the appeal of alternatives like Naxalism.  Today almost almost the entire state is considered Naxal effected and part of the so called 'Red corridor'. 


Fourteen years ago Jharkhand embarked on a journey of statehood and it would be fair to say that if at all there is a 'failed state' in this country it is probably Jharkhand

Two states of paralysis

Polling for the Vidhan Sabha's of  Jharkhand and Jammu and Kashmir is currently underway and results will be announced in a weeks time. In many ways this election is about two states struck in varying degrees of paralysis trying to affirm their faith in democracy, one more time. 

Just around the time when 'Haider' and the Jhelum floods have brought it back to the national discourse, Jammu & Kashmir might be heading into the most significant elections in its checkered democratic history . It seems that there is a real chance that the BJP might emerge as the single largest party in India's only Muslim majority province purely on the strength of performances in Jammu and Laddakh. Perhaps partly as a response to this possibility, people in the valley have come out to vote in large numbers, braving all manner of threats and turnout numbers in this election have been the highest recorded in decades. As Shekhar Gupta says, our liberal democracy is perhaps the best thing that we can offer to Kashmiris and in some ways democracy has already been the winner in this election.

Jharkhand on the other hand, has had its own share of misfortunes. In spite of being richly endowed with mineral resources, all but 3 of its 24 districts still make it to the list of the country's most backward and maoism is still a significant threat in large parts of this heavily forested state. Jharkhand's biggest failure though, in its short history of slightly more than a decade has been with the democratic process. In the 13 years since the formation of the state it has had 5 chief ministers and 9 governments, only one of them lasting more than two years, and none lasting more than three. All this interspersed with three periods of presidents rule. It also has the dubious distinction of being the only state in India's democreatic history, to have an independent MLA (Madhu Koda), as the chief minister of the state. As a result the short history of statehood has been a story of non-governance and neglect. However in spite of all of this, and in spite the fact that this is the second election in 6 months, the turnout in Jharkhand has also been impressive. 

With this post I start a series covering Jharkhand, which apart from an interesting four cornered contest is also the place i call home. Digging deep into data from Jharkhands elections these last couple of weeks has been an exercise in getting reintroduced to (vaguely) familiar names, and stories long forgotten. Anyway, nostalgia is indeed a time-consuming luxury i can ill afford and best to be getting back to business.

As always we get started with a couple of quick graphics on Jharkhands political geography, just to get our bearings straight. The following graphic shows the assembly constituencies of Jharkhand colored by region and by reservation category. 

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The creation of Jharkhand in late 2000 was the culmination of a sustained movement for tribal identity and statehood over nearly half a century. Hence not surprising that it has one of the heaviest concentrations (28/81) of constituencies reserved for scheduled tribes. 

In terms of regions it is often insightful to split Jharkhand into its five administrative divisions into which its 24 districts are divided into and consequently it is useful to understand their respective peculiarities a bit deeper. 

The Santhal Pargana (land of the santhals) division on the north eastern corner of the state has a long history of assertion of tribal identity going as far back as the santhal rebellion led by the legendary brothers Sidhu and Kanu. Its headquarter Dumka is also the second capital of Jharkhand and something of a political nursery having given rise to tribal leaders like Babulal Marandi and the Soren duo. 

The North Chhotanagpur or the Hazaribagh division,is where a large part of Jharkhand's coal deposits are located (Jharia, Dhanbad). It is also home to Bokaro (integrated steel plant) and Jhumri Telaiya (of mica mines and vividh bharati fame). 

The Kolhan Division (also called the Chaibasa division), on the south eastern edge has the bulk of Jharkhand's mineral wealth, and a significant bulk of its industries. The country's first integrated steel plant was built by Tata Steel in Jamshedpur, which also has a host of other Tata industries.

The Palamu division, on the north east is both heavily forested and considered one of the most backward in the country and the same is true for large parts of the Ranchi division. 

It may be also be noted that the concentration of scheduled tribe seats is primarily in the north-east (santhal pargana) and the south (Ranchi and Kolhan/Chaibasa).  Lastly while much of Jharkhand is classified as 'naxal effected' and part of the so called red corridor. The Palamu, Hazaribagh and Ranchi divisions are often classified as worst effected.

As we will see in later posts, these regions show subtle differences in their political proclivity. The next one i intend to take a look at the results from past elections in Jharkhand and try to figure out about what pointers the past offers on Jharkhand 2014.

Anatomy of a wave

The new BJP government completed 100 days in government a few days back. We have also had a couple of by-polls in between. Much has been written about the Lok Sabha election of 2014 and the persona of its protagonists in the interim and the discourse in the media both formal and social, has long since moved on to the the merits and performance of the new government. Now, four months after that mandate, the decisiveness of which was surprising to most and even shocking to some, is perhaps a good time to peel a few more layers of the onion and try to understand what really happened in the Lok Sabha elections in 2014.

The terms wave (or 'lehar' in hindi) is often used to describe a decisive swing in the pendulum of public opinion in Indian political writing. After 2014 superlatives like tsunami, or even 'tsunamo' have also been used by many (including yours truly). In this post I intend to try to dissect the results of 2014 to understand the anatomy of this phenomenon a little better, what constitutes a wave and how it manifests itself.

In the last post I ended with an analysis of the results of 2014 in the context of elections over the last 60 years. Here's a look at the graphic again.

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In terms of the definition we used for a wave, and in that context of a 'wave election' one can see similarities in the result of 2014 to previous ones in 1977, 1984 and to some extent in 1998. i.e. in each of those elections there was a definitive swing in vote share towards a party/formation riding the 'wave'. We know in hind-sight that in each of these elections there were strong reasons (or passions) for the dramatic shift in public opinion. While in 1977 it was a wave of anger against the emergency, in 1984 it was a sympathy wave after Indira Gandhi's assassination and in 1998 it was a culmination of the decade long and fractious Ram Janmabhumi movement as well as dejection with the first experiments with coalition politics

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Now if we look at the same picture but this time in terms of total votes instead of vote shares the phenomenon is  even more stark. In each of the so called wave elections the winning party (the one riding the wave) gained significantly in terms of  number of votes, surpassing the maximum they had ever garnered in the past by a significant margin. This is true for the Janta coalition in 1977 just as it is for the Congress in 1984 and for the BJP in 2014. Essentially one of the consequence of a wave election seems to be that the party riding it gains a significant incremental chunk of voters.

Also to be seen is that at least in 1977 and in 2014 the increase in the votes for the winner is not really at the cost of a similar decline for the loser. For example in 1977, there was a surge of support for the Janta coalition, but the congress did not do that badly in terms of the number of votes it secured. If anything it secured a marginally higher number of votes. We see the same in 2014 - compared to 2009 the BJP saw a 100% increase in the number of votes but it was not as if the Congress was decimated. In terms of the number of votes the decline for the congress was less than 10%.

So obviously there is another factor at play here and that is incremental voters (with respect to the previous year). The below graphic shows the trend in the number of votes cast over the years.  Here again we can see the spikes (in terms of percentage increase) in the wave elections of  1977, 1984 and 2014.

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It is fair to say that a significant chunk comes from newly registered first time voters, but there is also a fair share of the previously 'disinterested' voters, i.e. voters who did not find it worth their while to vote in the previous election. In other words the increment in the total number of voters  is a function of the increase in number of registered voters (newly registered first time voters) and the voter turnout (increase in which is from previously disinterested voters showing up).  The graphic below shows how both of these have trended over the years.

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We can see that the number of registered voters has been increasing through the years at a fairly uniform clip (bar spike in 1989 owing to the reduction of voting age from 21 to 18 and some ups and downs in the 1990's owing to cleaning up of electoral rolls). What is more interesting is the trend in voter turnout where we see spikes in the so called wave elections of 1977, 1984, 1998 and most prominently in 2014.

To sum it up, it seems that the defining characteristic of a so called wave election is the presence of a significant issue (real or emotive) that captures the imagination of the voting population leading to a dramatic increase in voter participation. What is even more interesting is that in all of these elections, it seems that this incremental vote (net new or previously disinterested) has a pronounced impact on the result, significantly adding to the vote base of the party riding the wave.

Now let us come back to the 2014 elections try to apply what we have seen to understand the nature of the wave/tsunami it turned out to be. As we saw in the earlier graphics, the 2014 election was an outlier both in terms of the increase in the number of registered voters  as well as the voter turnout.

The increase in the number of registered voters (at 13.7%) is the highest increase in the last 2 decades. On the other hand the voter turnout in this election, at 68%, is the highest vote share ever recorded in an Indian national election. It beats the high vote shares recorded in previous 'wave elections' by a margin and is a good 10% higher than the 58% recorded in 2009. Together this meant that that there were roughly 136 Million incremental voters in 2014 compared to 2009 translating to roughly a 33% jump. 

It is important to take a minute to digest the magnitude of these numbers. At 136 Million the number of incremental voters in India's lok Sabha election in 2014 was higher that the total number of voters in the last presidential elections of the next biggest democracy in the world (the US). In the domestic context this 136M incremental number roughly equals to the number of voters (2009) in the three most electorally significant states of UP, Maharashtra and West Bengal put together.

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The picture becomes even more stark when we look at how the number of voters has trended in the respective states(graphic above). A quick look at the graphic below shows that between 2009 and 2014 the number of voters in UP increased by 46% while in the case of Bihar it was close to 48%. In Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan it was greater than 50%.

What does this tell us? Essentiall that this election was not about holding on to traditional vote bases. It was all about getting the new guys and girls, the incremental voter. This is statement is truer for states like UP and Bihar, MP, Rajasthan, and Gujarat where the increase in the number of voters was close to 50%  though it could be applied reasonably to the rest of the country as well.

It also tells us that just looking at the vote shares can lead to fallacious impressions in this election. To delve deeper into what this means let us take a closer look at the results from UP, which it would be fair to say sprang the biggest surprise in this elections. Lets look at a graphic with the vote shares first.

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Simply looking at the vote share percentages might suggest that the the BJP's meteoric increase in UP is a direct consequence of the a steep decline in the Congress and the BSP and a smaller decline in the SP. It also seems that the growth momentum of support that Kanshi Ram and Mayavati had built over the last 5 elections is finally cracking up and even that the BSP's support base is deserting it.

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A look at the trend in the number of votes (graphic above) seems to contradict some of this. If we look at the graphic above what it tells us is that the only party losing in terms of the number of votes is the Congress. If anything the SP has improved its voter base quiet significantly and event Mayavati's BSP got marginally higher votes in 2014 than in 2009. The conclusion is simple - it is that broadly speaking it is not as if the BSP and SP's core support base, their loyal voters, deserted them in droves. The BJPs trippling its tally of votes in UP can only be explained by the hypotheses that they were successful in capturing a significant share of the incremental vote in UP.

Lets try to understand the demographic of this incremental voter a bit better. It would be fair to say the a big chunk of it would be late teens/twenty something, first time voters. This next generation of voters has been very aptly described as 'post ideological' by Shekhar Gupta. In other words, born in the late 80's early 90's, this generation of voters is in some sense the post mandal kamandal generation as well as the post liberalization generation. Is it possible that the new generation of OBC/dalit voter finds himself empowered enough to leave the comfort and safety of caste loyalties and anspire for something more. Maybe, but if thats the case then this should count as one of the successes of the identity based politics of the 90's. It would also mean that parties like SP and the BSP will have to evolve with the next generation of voters, just the politics of identity might not do.  This is probably even more applicable to the Congress than anyone else, just harping on the secular-communal line will probably not be enough . When was the last time you met a 20 something voter who identified with the Congress or was inspired by its 'young' leader. As the inimitable Ravish Kumar has pointed in many of his essays, politicians and parties will have to discover the message, idiom and medium to communicate to this new generation of voters.

Which finally brings us to the reasons for the increase in voter participation in this election. A lot of credit for this should go to the Election Commission of India. In the year preceding this election the ECI conducted numerous enrollment drives to register new voters and also created online channels for voter registration. However this by itself cannot explain the dramatic increase in the willingness of  gen-next and the middle class voter to come out of their shell and participate in the democratic process. The advent of social media and the gave an altogether new dimension to the election by providing voters with an active platform for political discourse. We can argue about the reach of the medium but its power as a amplifier/multiplier for a message was evident as early as the anti corruption and 'nirbhaya' protests. There was simmering discontent with the performance of the UPA government, and around the issues of corruption, but it was harnessed masterfully by one side who spoke to the next-gen voter, on their media, and put forward an aspirational agenda which was tailored for them. Maybe this is what the much talked wave of 2014 was all about.

A Tsunami it was..

So it is done, done and dusted. It has been more than 2 week since the results came in, and quite a couple of weeks it has been, a time of celebration for some and introspection for others. The BJP capped its phenomenal campaign with a final tally of 282 seats, in the process making this the first election in 30 years where one party has been able to win a simple majority on its own.  In the last post, I rambled on wondering what kind of ‘wave’ would be needed to drive the BJP to the kind of victory the opinion polls predicted for the BJP. The semantic debate seems settled now, nothing less than ‘tsunami’ would do to explain the upsurge of support that the BJP was able to muster especially in the keys states of UP and Bihar, a tsunami that has shattered many tenets of Indian politics and left several questions in its wake. 
  
While the result has kicked off another veritable tsunami of elation and anticipation on the right it has no doubt left a lot of liberal centrist friends disappointed. The reactions range from resignation to despair and denial. It is the last kind of reaction that I find particularly dangerous because it prevents the kind of introspection that is needed by believers of liberal centrism if they want to remain a political force to reckon with. There have been articles that seem to blame everything from the first past the post system to communal polarization to the BJP's marketing blitz. In my humble opinion romanticizing about proportional representation, blaming the electorate of being naive to (and even being complicit in) the dangers of communal politics or making Dentsu the scapegoat is not going to help. 

Diversity of ideas and thought is the driving force for any democracy and strong left/centrist forces are as important as strong rightist ones for the health of ours. Serious introspection is called for in the liberal/centrist camp, but even before that a humble acceptance of the mandate is absolutely essential. Here again there are a few cases where the denial is almost pathological, like one that called the result 'a stolen verdict'. Liberal thought would do well to pick its 'ambassadors' from the 'cheerleaders'. The intent in this post is to understand the result of this election in more detail and put some numbers around the magnitude of this verdict. 

Let me get done with the basics first. To start with the final tally by party and alliance – ‘mission 272’ accomplished for the BJP, with some to spare, and utter decimation for the congress, the likes of which it has never seen in its checkered history.  

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Next on the list is to take a quick look at the regional distribution of the seats, one that we have undoubtedly seen countless times but still throws out a couple insights every time it is re-examined. The graphic below does that and also compares with how it stacks in comparison to 2009.

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A lot has been talked about the BJP's sweep across north, west and central India and a picture is worth a thousand words, so i will not dwell on that. Just that it is interesting that the picture for 2014 looks like a saffron surge, with its epicenter in Gujarat and a focused thrust towards Purvanchal has washed through the country only meeting any significant resistance along the southern and south eastern coast.  Even here, the party's performance in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Assam, areas which they have not been strong traditionally, should be  encouraging to the BJP and unnerving to its opponents.

On the other hand its not a pretty picture for the congress. Its final tally of 44 is made even more miserable by the fact that  it has not crossed over to double digits in even a single state, i.e. it is not even left with significant pockets of regional influence to show for. In previous posts I have talked about how the urban seats were a significant factor in the Congress's  performance in the last election. This time the congress had to face a rout here - not even a single seat from the ~30 seats in the 7 Metros (including Bangalore, Hyderabad and Pune). Perhaps most galling for the Congress would be its performance in what have long been considered its bastions. The graphic below shows the results in constituencies where the Congress has won 8 or more times in the last 10 elections. 

The losses in Nanddurbar and Sangli, where the Congress has won every election all the way till 1977 (and even in 1977), and urban strongholds like Mysore and Nagpur would hurt and should.

Moving on, lets take a quick look at polygonal contests in this election ( more on polygonality and method used in a previous post) 

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As expected, the elections in Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh were almost entirely direct contest between the BJP and the Congress. Maharashtra threw up a bit of a surprise in the sense that it was largely a 2 cornered contest this time between the BJP-Sena and Congress-NCP alliances. Unlike the last election the MNS (in Mumbai) and BSP (in Vidharba) did not play a significant role (more on the effect MNS had in 2009). Also, as expected wherever there was a direct contest between the BJP and Congress the BJP has made a clean sweep.

A quick look at the margins of victory (below) also shows the gulf between the two parties in Western and Central India (where they are engaged in largely a direct contest)

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The next graphic shows the distribution of seats and vote shares across the different states and union territories. 

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Once again it shows the gulf in vote share that led to the BJP sweep in north and west India. In MP it is ~ 20%, in Gujarat ~ 30% and in Rajasthan ~25%. In the 3 and 4 cornered contests of UP and Bihar the BJP had a 20% and 10% lead respectively over its nearest opponent. In a first past the post system, a 20% vote share differential, more often than not leads to a complete sweep as we saw this time (as always move the cursor over the graphic to use the interactive features of tableau)

One quick look at the map of constituencies by winning party in 2014 also shows that the the BJP has announced itself in the very frontiers of the country - the northern most constituency - Ladakh, the Western most - Kachchh, the easternmost, Arunachal East and the southern most (doesnt matter if we think it is Kanyakumari or Andaman & Nicobar Islands), have all gone to the BJP. This seems to be the election where the BJP has made the transition to a truly national party - or at least as national a party as there is today. The graphic below shows this a bit more clearly - this is the first time the BJP (or any other party for that matter) has won seats in more states than the Congress has.

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Lastly any analysis of an election would be incomplete without a historical context. The graphic below shows how the vote shares garnered by the BJP and the Congress compare with their historical performance. I bring it up towards the end because I believe that in the context of this election comparing vote shares is kind of misleading, primarily because of the huge increase in the number of voters this time. Never the less it is still important to talk about, in terms of broader trends.

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Five thing can be seen right away. 
Firstly the Congress is at the worst that it has been in its history, not just in terms of seats, but also in terms of vote share. The 19% it mustered this time is a good 10% lower than what it had in its previous low in 1998. It will take something radical to reverse this downward trend but all indications are that the grand old party will turn to the dynasty again for salvation like it did in 1998. In itself that might not be sufficient

Secondly, for the BJP, this is the first time it has crossed the Congress in terms of vote share. Even in its previous prime, in 1998, it was marginally below the Congress. Seen together the curves for the BJP and the Congress almost seem to suggest that that there has been an exodus of voters from the Congress to the BJP. Suffice to say now that this would be a simplistic conclusion to make.  

Thirdly, the communists continue on the path of steady decline, one that started around the time they made the 'historical blunder' in 1996, and was only briefly reversed in the 2004 election. With 11 seats between them and a meager 5% vote share they are pretty much at the lowest point in their history (barring the first election in 1951). For all practical purposes they have been relegated to regional pockets in Kerala, West Bengal and Tripura.

Fourthly, the fate of the remnants of Janta movement, the ideological progeny of JP, seems to be in a state of terminal decline. The word socialist is probably inappropriate for this motley group as they exist today, retaining influence only as caste based parties. So what really happened in UP? Are caste equations as an electoral strategy dead? Attempting to understand this tectonic shift in the politics of India's heartland will need more thought, perhaps a separate post.

Fifthly, Many see this election together with the one in 2009 as signs of the retreat of regionalism from Indian polity. I believed that this argument is again simplistic. Even in this election when for the first time in 30 years the country has given a simple majority to one party, the regional parties taken together are only increasing in influence. For all we know, the primary opposition for the BJP in the coming election may be in the form of a federal front. 

To end with, any which way one looks at it, this is a thumping victory for the BJP and crushing defeat for the Congress. There is no point in belittling the 31% vote share, it is still the highest vote share that a single party has secured in the last 5 general elections. And if we think it in terms of pre-poll alliances we would have to go all the way back to 1989 to find a vote share higher than the NDA's 38%. Even Nehru, the most popular congress leader in independent India by far, could never muster more than 48%. His grandson did but even Rajiv Gandhi, with 4/5th majority did not cross the 50% mark- that mark has never been breached. That is how the first past the post system in a multiparty democracy works. Of course, it is not perfect. Of course, It leads to anomaly like the BSP getting close to 20% and no seats in UP, but these are the rules of the game. One can’t give oneself a reasonable shot at winning if one stays in denial of the rules. The Center-left of Indian politics has to set its house in order - but that is only going to be possible if they solemnly accept this mandate, feel the gravel in the mouth, and think about what needs to be done to make a comeback.