Jharkhand: guide to results

Published here
Ranchi, April 15

The BJP in Jharkhand will go into counting day confident that, on paper, it remains in contest in all 14 seats.

However, by making the elections all about itself - the party contested alone, and along with the JVM(P), is the only one to contest in all seats - the BJP state unit is flirting with the failure tag. Even one less than eight, which was the number of seats won in 2009, would have the panic bells going off.

Party leaders are confident of winning more than 10 seats. "We are guaranteed 12 seats. Giridih and Rajmahal are the two in which we are facing a tough contest," said BJP leader and MLA Raghubar Das. The Congress says it, along with alliance partner JMM, has a chance in eight constituencies. "I think we can win in Ranchi, Lohardaga, Hazaribagh, Dhanbad, Godda, Giridih, Rajmahal and Dumka," said state Congress General Secretary Shailesh Sinha.

There clearly cannot be a universe where both the BJP and Congress can go home happy. The confusion is evident in the exit poll results: NDTV thinks BJP will win 12 and leave the Congress only one, while Times Now estimates the Congress and JMM will win six. Both agree that former chief minister Madhu Kora's wife Geeta will win from Singhbhum.

Early warning could come from two constituencies - Giridih and Rajmahal, which both sides admit to be unknown territories. The BJP, in a "direct fight" with the JMM in both, knows winning the two will make it unstoppable. If the latter wins in Giridih, it will be a major blow for the BJP, whose incumbent MP won by 94,738 votes in 2009. It will also mean that the JMM votebank is robust, having withstood an assault from alliance partner Congress, whose leader Rajendra Prasad wanted the seat for his son. A JMM win will also mean the rise of a new Mahato leader in Jagarnath Mahato. That Rajmahal - and not Dumka - should be the barometer of Santhal Pargana is curious: BJP's victory hinges on adivasi votes in the constituency, which has a significant number of Muslims. The party hopes that former JMM leader Hemlal Murmu can get some tribal votes while hoping the RSS, which has been active in the area for about 25 years, can use the hype around Narendra Modi to rally Sanskritised adivasis.

However, even if the BJP completes a clean sweep, it may not be evidence enough of a pan-Jharkhand "Modi Wave": the difficult terrain, demographics and cultural differences in the state mean imposing a wave was always out of the question for the BJP. Even winning Dumka - stronghold of the JMM - may be interpreted as a Babulal Marandi effect, with the JVM(P) leader taking away JMM's votes, leading to a BJP victory.

However, there may be a Modi effect on view. The tribals remained largely disinterested in Narendra Modi - in fact, the Sarna Samiti, widely perceived to be moving towards the BJP, supported Congress candidates in Ranchi and Lohardaga. This has been used by the BJP in the Santhal Pargana to mobilise the non-tribal "diku" vote of the caste Hindus. The hype of a Wave was also used to activate cadres and banish disquiet - in Palamu and Hazaribagh, those dissenting against "outsider" candidates eventually fell in line to work for a Modi victory.

If the BJP candidates in Ranchi and Jamshedpur win, it could be evidence of a Modi Wave in these largely urban constituencies. These two constituencies are significant because the BJP was up against the wall in both places - Jamshedpur, where its candidate lost his deposit in a 2011 bye poll and whose incumbent MP is a very popular; Ranchi, where AJSU's Sudesh Mahto was poised to eat into BJP's Ram Tahal Choudhary's Mahato base.

The BJP also claims that the poll percentages going up in the state - from 50.97 in 2009 to 63.55 now - is because of a Modi Wave. While one cannot verify this claim yet, there remains the possibility that Muslims voted in large numbers too, by getting women to come out and vote. A BJP leader claimed caste Hindus had voted to counter that. "Only 52 per cent Muslims voted in Jamshedpur. The rest were women and youth coming out to vote for NaMo," he said, explaining how polling percentage went up from 51.12 in 2009 to 66.38 this time there.

Apart from Geeta Kora in Singhbhum, smaller parties stand a chance to spoil the BJP's party. The CPI (ML) Liberation has mobilised the dalits of Koderma effectively. In Khunti, no one really understands the impact of the alleged support extended by left wing extremist PLFI to Anosh Ekka.