The BJP will be upping its “vote jihad” campaign in Maharashtra as a response to the Opposition’s allegations regarding electoral lists in the state ahead of the local polls, with Leader of the Opposition (LoP) Rahul Gandhi’s ‘H-Files’ press conference on Haryana Wednesday expected to give them a fillip.
“We took the anti-Constitution narrative of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) lightly in last year’s Lok Sabha polls and paid a heavy price. It served as an eye-opener. Now, we are determined to counter every issue effectively, with our ‘vote jihad’ campaign,” a BJP poll manager told The Indian Express.
The BJP won only nine of the state’s 48 Lok Sabha seats last year, as against the 23 it won in 2019.
To boost its vote jihad campaign, sources said the BJP will deploy workers at the taluka level across the 288 Assembly constituencies of the state, with Cabinet minister and former Mumbai chief Ashish Shelar to play a key role.
“Why are the MVA and the MNS (Maharashtra Navnirman Sena) only talking about duplicate votes regarding the Marathi Manoos or Hindus? Why are they silent on Muslims?” Shelar told The Indian Express on Wednesday, alleging “duplicate voting” by Muslims in Karjat-Jamkhed, Mumbra, Kalra, Malad West and Dharavi.
According to Shelar, “Statistics show at least 10.6 lakh duplicate Muslim votes across the state’s 288 seats.”
State BJP chief Ravindra Chavan said the party was only countering the Opposition’s narrative in “a language they understand”. “When allegations of vote chori surfaced, BJP leaders were among the first to acknowledge that revision of electoral rolls was required. The Opposition is only concerned about pushing a fake narrative to tarnish the BJP’s image,” he said, questioning its protests against the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls being rolled out nationwide by the Election Commission.
Navanth Ban, BJP media cell in-charge, said the BJP’s politics and campaigns are “development driven” but it was “important to show a mirror” to the Opposition. “We are just pointing to their discriminatory politics of Muslim appeasement,” he said.
A BJP leader said that the Satyacha Morcha (rally for truth) held by the Opposition recently, in which the Raj Thackeray-led MNS participated, prompted the party to accelerate its “love jihad” campaign. At the rally, the Opposition alleged a “State Election Commission (SEC)-BJP nexus” to rig the local polls.
Congress state chief Harshvardhan Sapkal said its return to “vote jihad” allegations showed the BJP “thrives on creating hatred among people”.
“The RSS/BJP is anti-Muslim and anti-Dalit. They work on their communal agenda to create conflict and divide society,” Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) chief Prakash Ambedkar said.
What is “vote jihad”
In 2021-22, right-wing outfits like the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal, along with religious heads united under the Sakal Hindu Samaj banner, launched a campaign to unite Hindus, dubbed by it as “love jihad”.
In the run-up to last year’s Lok Sabha and Assembly polls, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, among others, hinted at a campaign to drive a wedge between Hindu voters. If Modi gave slogans like “Ek hain toh safe hain (We are safe if united)”, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath warned the people, “Batenge toh katenge (Divided we fall)”.
After the 2024 Lok Sabha setback in Maharashtra surprised the NDA, Fadnavis blamed “vote jihad” for the BJP’s diminished tally in Maharashtra. “Despite retaining its vote share, the BJP lost seats due to vote jihad. People of a particular community united against Hindus in at least 14 constituencies,” he said. He gave the example of the Dhule seat, claiming that while the BJP candidate led in all five Assembly segments falling under it, he was defeated as Muslims ensured a 100% turnout of the community’s voters in Malegaon.
As the politics of “vote chori” and duplication heats up in Maharashtra, State Election Commissioner Dinesh Waghmare on Tuesday said the poll body has devised a mechanism to tackle the issues. “When a voter arrives at a polling station, a double star will be marked on a few of them. This will be a sign for polling officials to rectify the identity of the voters. Such voters will be required to sign a declaration that they are not casting their vote elsewhere,” he added.
The first phase of the local body polls will involve 246 municipal councils and 42 nagar panchayats. They will vote on December 2, with results to be announced a day later.