Indian National Congress is by far the worst thing that has happened to Independent India. And its not just me saying that, its a lot of Indians saying that throughout these past seven decades by means of their voting exercise. Although, the party is quite useless, but it still enjoyed 19% votes in 2019. This election and probably the next one, might render them completely irrelevant.
Below are two charts depicting the trajectories of both the national parties in India i.e. INC and BJP. The red line indicates the vote share for the party (the values shown on the right vertical axis), the columns indicate the number of seats won (the values on the left axis). I have taken 1984 as the first year, as that was the year where BJP came into existence and had its first national election.
There are several observations that one can make from these two charts.
First and the simplest one, the slop of BJP’s vote share trajectory is upward looking, whereas the same for INC is downward looking. BJP has been increasing its voter base not just in last ten years but sine 1984. On the other hand, Congress has been losing its vote share since 1984.
Second, you could further divide the trajectories in three different sections: one, from 1984 to 1996; two, from 1996 to 2009; and three, from 2009 onwards.
Why is this important to look at the different sections?
Because only then we can see that the INC lost its biggest share of voters in between 1984 and 1996. It started from 49% vote share in 1984 and ended up at 29% vote share in 1996; a loss of 20%. There were no EVMs to be blamed, it was happening right under Congress’ rule (Rajiv Gandhi was the Prime Minister in 1984 to 91 and PV Narsimha Rao from 1991).
Elections are around the corner for 2024 and Congress sympathizers along with the left ecosystem in India will get active now trying to prove that Congress is losing because the country is not a democracy any more but has turned in dictatorship, EVMs are hacked, government institutions are being used against the opposition etc.
Was democracy dead between 1984 to 1996? Was it a dictatorship? Were institutions like ED, CBI, Judiciary used to suppress Congress? Was Social Media disseminating fake news and confusing people?
People were indeed running away from Congress as fast as they could.
Third, the two almost horizontal lines between 1991 and 1996 for BJP and 2014 and 2019 for INC. They signify something extremely crucial.
Early 90s was the time when the country was going through a very disturbing phase, divisive vote bank politics be it on the basis of cast or religion was at its unprecedented level . For example, Babri Masjid Demolition happened in 1992. The interesting fact is that while the pseudo-secular intellectuals are always more than happy to blame BJP for it, however the facts tell something else. BJP’s vote share did not change a bit between 1991 and 1996 and stayed intact at 20%, however, congress fell from 36% vote share in 1991 to 29% in 1996.
You might want to ask, if Congress’ vote share reduced and BJP’s stayed the same, who gained? Here is where the other so-called secular politicians like Lalu Prasad Yadav, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Mayawati asserted their presence like never before; the filthy, anarchist, parasitic, bigoted politics.
What started in 1991 came to an end in 2019 (almost to an end, what ever is left would become obsolete in 2024 or latest by 2029) The period (2014-19) is exactly inverse of what happened in between 1991 and 1996. This time the vote share of Congress stayed exactly the same at 19% but BJP gained almost 6% from 31% to 37%.
Who lost?
The regressive vote bank politics of political parties like SP, BSP and RJD succumbed to the progress politics of development and growth.
Now you can see why Rahul Gandhi and his Congress party are openly pushing caste into politics. Rahul Gandhi today is not shy about caste based divisive politics, he is openly and without gumption promising things like caste based census and removing 50% cap on caste based reservation. He is simply trying to reclaim the voters that Congress lost in the 90s to parties like SP, BSP and RJD.
Rahul Gandhi can walk across the length and breadth of the country as many times as he wants, he could even crawl, going amongst people and asking their castes on streets will make it even worse. This will start a downward spiral for Congress exactly as it happened in 1984. People voted for parties like SP, BSP and RJD because they promised “Social Justice” for the oppressed communities. These parties lost voters’ trust because they now know what these parties actually did in the garb of social justice. Indian voters are never going to fall for he same “social justice” theory. Voters did not sign up for more crime like murders, kidnaps, rapes, gangrapes, extortion in the name of social justice.
The very fact that in today’s high tech world with a very different kind of problems, Rahul Gandhi is basing his campaign on caste shows that Congress hasn’t changed a bit. It is still the same party that Indians have been trying to run away from. Even before 1984, voters were running away from the party except for 1984 when the party enjoyed its highest every tally with close to 49% votes as a result of the assassination of Mrs. Indira Gandhi. If you remove that one year, the vote share has been constantly decreasing. Have a look:
1977 was the election which was held during emergency. That election was like the elections that happened recently in Pakistan, where political leaders were in jail. If we remove 1977 and 1984 from the graph, the decline is very straight forward.
In the end, I would like to say that everyone wants a strong opposition, but no body wants to work towards creating that strong opposition.
Thanks for reading. Please do share it with your friends and family who might get confused with the narrative that democracy is in danger in India or elections aren’t fair any more etc. Let the truth prevail. I can not emphasis how important it is to share articles like this and crush the narratives that damages India’s improving reputation.
Also have a look at:
- 2024 Election Strategy: Rahul Gandhi’s Nyay Yatra vs Ayodhya Nagri’s Ram Mandir
- The truth of Rahul Gandhi’s interaction in Silicon Valley
- Rahul Gandhi’s election pitch is a broken record
- Is Rahul Gandhi laying a foundation for Congress Mukt Bharat?
- Indian National Congress will lose 2024 like Indian National Cricket Team lost WC2023; here is why.
- Congress’ Election Manifesto: 7 major reasons why you should never vote for INC ever again
- The one difference between the Congress of today and that of before 2014
Infinite Sea of Opportunities 
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