Despite inevitable attempts by BJP leaders to isolate Narendra Modi from the outcome of the Bihar assembly elections, there is little doubt that the results represent a personal setback for the Prime Minister. Not only was Modi the face of the BJP campaign, he addressed dozens of rallies, deep in the Bihar heartland, going further than perhaps any other Prime Minister has ever gone in canvassing votes in the state.
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It is possible to argue that the NDA government at the Centre has nothing to worry about: it has won a solid mandate till the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. But politics is as much about perception as it is about numbers; or, to use a phrase which BJP strategists were fond of bandying about during the long Bihar election campaign, the Modi government’s image is “not about arithmetic but chemistry”.
It was possible to dismiss the Delhi assembly results as a flash in the pan, but the Bihar loss is big. Not only because of the size of the state, but Modi’s personal investment in the polls. Attempts by Modi to bring a religious angle into the poll campaign by hinting at a grand alliance “conspiracy” to introduce minority reservations seem to have backfired.
The BJP defeat will embolden disgruntled NDA allies like the Shiv Sena. Modi may also be forced to reach out to the Congress to push crucial reforms through the Rajya Sabha. A crucial question is whether the Prime Minister will visibly distance himself from BJP and Sangh leaders who have made communally charged statements in the past few months. If the past is any indication, the answer may not be in the affirmative.
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