What explains Congress’ smug cockiness? Why is that such a corrupt and uniformly non-performing entity seems to have a stranglehold over Indian electorate? Is Hindutva to blame for BJP’s stagnation and Congress’ dominance? Should BJP embrace a leftist economic model? Does BJP lack a youthful face?
Answers to these questions are complex. But if we understand the basic electoral landscape, the solutions would be a lot more effective.
Indian electoral landscape, broadly segmented, looks something like this:
A) 10% middle and upper middle class – thinks (or aspires to think) in English.
B) 25% minorities
C) 65% subdivided along regional, class and caste lines
Group A seldom votes, wearing its ‘disdain for politics’ as a badge of honor (Ex: 43% voting in Mumbai post-26/11).
The battle over secularism is of interest to groups A and B.
Group B will never vote for BJP – unless BJP gets self-neutered and gives up on issues dear to its ideological core. Though Gujarat under NaMo has started attracting this group, the best BJP can achieve in 2014 is to prevent Group B from registering an aggressive negative vote against it.
More importantly, rapid urbanization is moving rural Group C voters into urban areas. The change may be only geographic, with survival continuing to be the defining existential reality. BJP’s traditional, urban stronghold is up for grabs thanks to this demographic change.
Bottom line: Win Group C = rule India.
As things stand – BJP’s message and the means used to deliver it (Blogs, websites, TV debates, etc.) are targeted principally at group A. And therein lies the problem.
Congress has perfected the art of marketing to Group C. And where its largesse falls short, it creates divisionary leaders like Raj Thackeray. It uses a combination of fear and dole to keep Group C voters poor and beholden to the Congress and its allies.
Before diving into the ‘how’ of winning the Group C segment, let us first try to understand its Voter profile.
Voter profile:
Urban: Lower middle class, blue collar workers, migrants, etc.
Rural: Subsistence farmers, small store owners, daily wage laborers, etc.
Issues of importance: Survival
Influencers: Communal inputs, relatives, friends, community leaders, school teachers, religious leaders, etc.
Channels: Radio, Word-of-mouth, informal human networks, TV (Potential channels: SMS)
Value Proposition: Handouts: Free power, Fertilizer subsidies, etc.
Attention Span: Limited to a few minutes/hours a month
Immediate concern: Survival
But is this profile justified? Is this is an accurate profile or at best an oversimplified caricature?
The proof of the pudding lies in voting patterns. If election after elections in the past 10 years (baring a handful of results such as Gujarat, Bihar, (and even) Delhi) are being decided by short term issues and voters are being successfully seduced by color TVs, we know handouts are working.
It can be argued that these inducements are working because BJP has failed to present a viable alternative. But what is this alternative?
The alternative (and btw it is the CORRECT solution) to handouts is investing in infrastructure – roads, power, water, etc.
There is however a critical hurdle(s) in deploying this alternate model as an electoral strategy.
Here’s why:
a) Its very difficult to explain it to a Group C voter who has very little discretionary time to understand this model and connect the dots
b) Benefits of this model take time to accrue,
c) Handouts tend to have an immediate (though fleeting) impact
d) ‘India Shining’ was an attempt to shape this alternative model into a viable electoral strategy but it failed
To further illustrate the efficacy of this model let us analyze Gujarat’s past failures in attracting this group and its recent successes with targeting this segment.
Over the past 4-5 years, I have argued across several forums (twitter, blog comments, etc.) that NaMo’s support base is like an ‘iceberg’ in that a vast pool of NaMo supporters remains hidden below the surface, willing to vote for him, but afraid to extend a public endorsement.
But what the above model suggests is that most of this support is coming from Group A voters. Within Gujarat, NaMo has achieved the rare feat of energizing Group A voters and his ground troops have converted this support into voter turnout on election days.
Until (and including) LS elections of 2009, Group C voters have continued to hold back in significant numbers. This is evident from the 11 seats secured by a comatose Congress in Gujarat during LS elections 2009.
However, between 2009 and 2011, BJP has won a landslide in almost every local body election and bye election. The only variable seems to be the series of ‘Garib Kalyan Mela’ programs launched across Gujarat.
By any yardstick this is a ‘direct handout’. With one vital difference: A typical govt. handout program sans middlemen.
And it seems to have worked.
Its success can be attributed to the fact that from a marketing perspective, such programs work at multiple levels.
a) The benefits are tangible and immediate
b) The causal connection between govt. programs and people’s welfare, is intutive
c) There is a clear identification of source of benefits: NaMo and BJP
d) Efficient delivery of these programs clearly differentiates it from corrupt Congress initiatives which promise much but deliver little
e) The message is highly portable and can be delivered through various channels – word of mouth, radio, TV, SMS, etc.
f) Political opposition to any such program is fraught with inviting an immediate and massive voter backlash
NOTE: Does this suggest that BJP should abandon work on key infrastructure projects – Power, roads, etc.
Answer: NO. Both ‘Direct Handouts’, infrastructure development and dismantling of license raj must go hand in hand. These are not mutually exclusive.
Given the efficacy of ‘direct handouts’ what then should be BJP’s message.
Fairly simple: BJP brings you a corruption-free ‘Mai Baap’.
Logon ka paisa, Neta ki jeb mey nahi - logon ki jeb mey
Also, this ‘Efficient Mai Baap’ program needn’t be a plain vanilla dole system. There could be creative variations to direct-deposit of govt. handouts: School vouchers being a good example.
Bottom line: BJP must present itself as a corruption-free mai-baap and contrast itself from Congress the corruption-ridden mai-baap.
