NEW DELHI: PM Narendra Modi announced on Friday to repeal farm laws in the upcoming winter session of Parliament. The public discourse and Opposition leaders gave a political angle to this announcement as elections are due in farmer-dominated states like Punjab and Uttar Pradesh early next year.
But the statistics from last year and this year show that the BJP in fact won several elections and seats after the farm laws were passed in the parliament in September 2020.
In May this year, BJP won 60 out of 93 seats it contested in Assam that has more than 80 % of its population in rural hinterlands
In West Bengal, BJP lifted its tally from 3 to 77 seats in the 291-member assembly this May.
Similarly, in Puducherry in May, BJP formed the government in Puducherry for the first time ever after it got six out of 9 seats it had contested in this southern union territory. Congress managed only two out of 14 seats.
BJP though had faced drubbing in Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh by-polls where local factors like death of a tall leader and ex chief minister Virbhadra Singh generated a huge sympathy wave.
Earlier in Gujarat this year, BJP had won all six municipal corporations of Gujarat which include Surat, Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Jamnagar, Rajkot and Bhavnagar, putting up its best performance in two decades by winning 483 of the total 576 seats.
BJP had won 84% of the total seats in these elections compared to the previous municipal polls held in 2015 when it had bagged 68% of the seats.
In UP too that goes to polls next year, BJP in Uttar Pradesh in June this year swept the zila panchayat chairpersons’ elections after candidates backed by the party attained victory in 67 of 75 seats. Of 67, BJP won 21 seats unopposed. Even in Telangana by-poll in October this year itself, BJP had won Huzurabad Assembly constituency by defeating the ruling TRS.
In Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka, BJP had won Johat and Sindgi by-polls too
One of BJP’s biggest victories had come last year in Jammu and Kashmir when the saffron party emerged as the largest in the maiden District Development Council (DDC) election with 75 seats in Jammu while the Gupkar alliance had emerged victorious with 112 seats after sweeping Kashmir in December 2020. Even in Kashmir — a territory known for hotbed of terrorism, apple and saffron farmers and willow traders — BJP opened its account with three seats.