While addressing a press conference at Allahabad Press Club
Prayagraj: “Rahul Gandhi’s repeated assertions that Narendra Modi will not be prime minister for a third term may appear to be a deliberate attempt to challenge the electoral narrative of his invincibility, but the Congress party’s cold calculations also suggest that the BJP will fall short of the 272 majority mark this time around. Congress strategists anticipate the BJP would lose a significant number of seats in several states, while gains will be minor in others. The Congress leadership believes the BJP and its allies would suffer significant losses in Maharashtra, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Rajasthan, and Haryana, with minor losses also expected in Delhi, Gujarat, Himachal, Jharkhand, and Assam,” said UP Congress incharge of election campaign committee Shekhar Bahuguna while addressing a press conference at Allahabad Press Club on Wednesday.
“Surprisingly, Congress officials concede the BJP might increase its vote share in Telangana by two seats and gain one in Odisha. They are deeply suspicious of the BJP’s claims in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. We do not expect the BJP will win support in Bengal. They won 18 seats in 2019, and our feedback suggests that they might be limited to 14-15 this time. While they may win one or two more seats than they did in 2019, we hear that the animosity between BJD and BJP members and leaders has grown, and Naveen Patnaik is eager to teach Modi his place this time,” senior Congress leader Shekhar Bahuguna opined.
Bahuguna predicts that overall gains should be about five or six seats across the country, but losses will be massive, “in the range of 60-70 or more.” That is why Rahul Gandhi and our president, Mallikarjun Kharge, have said that Modi would not get a majority. In reality, the drop is continuing, and the position for the BJP might deteriorate further after the last round of voting, according to the senior politician. Another Congress politician, Javed Urfi echoing similar thoughts, stated that the BJP is widely expected to lose seats in Bihar, Karnataka, and Haryana. However, the true comeback occurred when voter opinion in Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh shifted substantially. According to reports from the ground, people are resisting the BJP in this election.
In Maharashtra, civil society organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and students formed groups to raise voter knowledge on Modi’s ideas and pledges. According to him, there was an anti-Modi wave in several locations. “Other variables, such as support for Uddhav Thackeray, resentment of two Gujarati leaders’ anti-Maharashtra stances – Modi and Amit Shah – and the combined might of Congress, Sharad Pawar, and the Shiv Sena, hampered the BJP, noted Bahuguna. “While even BJP officials admit that the 48 seats would be divided vertically, some local leaders predict the Maha Vikas Aghadi will exceed 30. The NDA once had 42 seats. This translates to a significant defeat for the NDA, even as the BJP manages to reduce its own losses,” claimed Shekhar Bahuguna.
He also stated that the Congress party began in Uttar Pradesh with low aspirations. “We aimed to prevent the BJP from winning 70 of 80 seats. Mayawati’s unwillingness to join INDIA was upsetting. However, a couple things occurred unexpectedly. While the challenges of pricing, unemployment, and Agniveer grew in importance, they had an impact on the Ram temple. The word about the BJP’s plan to amend the Constitution reached deep into the Dalit and disadvantaged groups,” Bahuguna stressed. He said that Mayawati’s silence, as well as the withdrawal of her nephew Akash Anand from the battlefield, convinced Dalit voters that the BSP was not battling the BJP. He noted that the party received an unexpected boost from the influx of Dalits and youngsters in its favor.
He also stated that the Congress party began in Uttar Pradesh with low aspirations. “We aimed to prevent the BJP from winning 70 of 80 seats. Mayawati’s unwillingness to join INDIA was upsetting. However, a couple things occurred unexpectedly. While the challenges of pricing, unemployment, and Agniveer grew in importance, they had an impact on the Ram temple. The word about the BJP’s plan to amend the Constitution reached deep into the Dalit and disadvantaged groups,” he stressed. He said that Mayawati’s silence, as well as the withdrawal of her nephew Akash Anand from the battlefield, convinced Dalit voters that the BSP was not battling the BJP. He noted that the Congress party received an unexpected boost from the influx of Dalits and youngsters in its favor.
“It is not yet evident that the BJP has been eliminated from the picture,” he stated. “Upon gaining roughly 230 seats, they will make every effort to establish a government. Yet if Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh prove to be worse than they had anticipated at this point, they might falter much more. In Gujarat, where at least three seats are predicted, the BJP’s downfall is most demonstrated. We’re going to put up a fierce effort to take two more from BJP. The BJP’s decline across the entire nation will be more severe if it can lose five in Gujarat,” he claimed. “Modi, the departing prime minister, was introduced by him. As expectations of political parties are based on impressions rather than actual empirical evaluation, these computations may not be as valuable as Congress hopes,” he opined.
“The 400-plus forecast made by the BJP appears to have already gone wrong,” he suggested. In his opinion, the Prime Minister’s words convey desperation rather than confidence. “The extreme transformations in Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, which have given the opposition more confidence to envision thwarting the Modi’s apple cart, may be the source of this desperation,” he said prior to signing off.
