Hindu consolidation pays off in Assam Assembly elections

Once again, religious identity emerged as a determining factor in the State

After wresting Assam from the Congress in 2016, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was able to retain the State in the recently concluded Assembly election, thus strengthening its eastern footprint. In 2016, the BJP successfully consolidated Hindu votes in a State where elections were largely governed by the multiple ethnicities it hosts. The story after five years remains more or less the same, with religious identity yet again emerging as one of the key determinants for electors, albeit on a slightly muted level. Of course, the Lokniti-CSDS post-poll survey data indicate relatively high satisfaction with both the Central and State governments among voters and the absence of a strong anti-incumbency sentiment, but whether these favourable sentiments were driven by the religious divide remains a moot point. Though the Congress forged Mahajot, a grand pre-election alliance with the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), the Bodoland People’s Front (BPF) and Left parties, the ruling alliance managed to defeat it. In fact, the Congress’s tie-up with the ‘Muslim party’ AIUDF seems to have helped the National Democratic Alliance’s (NDA) cause, helping them keep Hindu voters firmly on their side and wean away a small but sizeable chunk of Assamese Muslim voters. The two local parties, the Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP) and the Raijor Dal (RD), had a limited impact, and the latter could win just one seat in Upper Assam. Their influence remained confined to Upper Assam.