By Pankaj Yadav
NEW DELHI, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- India witnessed hectic political activities on Saturday, even as ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah and main opposition Indian National Congress (INC) president Rahul Gandhi, respectively, toured two different states in a bid to garner votes ahead of the next general elections scheduled for 2019.
The two leaders spent their days in the states geographically located diametrically opposite to each other. While Shah was in eastern state of West Bengal, Gandhi carried out a road show in the western state of Rajasthan.
Incidentally, in both cases, it's the BJP's and INC's political adversaries who are ruling the state presently. BJP's bete noire Trinamool Congress (TMC), a state level party, has a strong political base in West Bengal, which is running the state government, whereas the BJP is the ruling party in Rajasthan.
Both the TMC and INC are politically and ideologically opposed to the BJP, and are likely to form an alliance after the next general elections in a bid to stop the BJP from forming its second consecutive central government.
In 2014 polls, the BJP had swept several states, including Rajasthan, Gujarat, Delhi, Chattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Jharkhand, from where it had won a whopping 188 out of the total 201 parliamentary constituencies among them. In all the BJP had won in 282 constituencies in the last polls.
There are 545 seats in India's lower house "Lok Sabha," out of which 543 go to polls every five years, while two members are subsequently appointed from among the Anglo-Indian community.
West Bengal, which is considered as a stronghold of TMC president and state chief minister Mamta Banerjee, was one state where the BJP could win in just two parliamentary constituencies out of the total 42.
On more than one occasion, Shah has expressed his desire to win in at least 22 constituencies in the state in the next polls. To achieve this objective, the party has been actively working on the readying the national register of citizens (NRC), according to which the illegal immigrants, mainly from the neighboring country Bangladesh, are "identified" and only the genuine Indian citizens get included in the NRC.
The presence of illegal immigrants in West Bengal and other eastern states, in particular, and in the country, in general, has been a political issue in the country for the past couple of decades, especially when elections are round the corner.
While the BJP has been demanding "identification" of such illegal migrants, they are seen as a "vote-bank" by the political parties principally opposed to the BJP.
"I have come here to oppose the TMC policies and state chief minister Mamata Banerjee," said Shah while addressing a public rally in state capital Kolkata.
"Many years back Mamata Banerjee had demanded identifying the illegal immigrants in the state, but now she is opposing our attempt of carrying out the same effort," he added.
The BJP acknowledges the fact that it had reached a saturation point in some states in which its tally is bound to come down in the next polls. In such a scenario, Shah is striving hard to explore "greener pastures" in a bid to win a significant number of constituencies, matching BJP's performance in 2014, so as to ensure that his party remains in power for a second consecutive term.
On the other hand, Gandhi is leaving no stone unturned to ensure BJP and its allies' defeat in the coming elections. His Rajasthan tour on Saturday assumed even more significance even as the state is scheduled to witness Assembly elections this year-end, a couple of months ahead of the parliamentary polls (slated for the first quarter of next year).
Besides Rajasthan, three more states namely Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Mizoram, are also slated to go for state polls this year-end.
Gandhi is sure his party would win the next state elections and form the government in Rajasthan.
Over the past couple of decades, Rajasthan state has been alternatively ruled by the BJP and the INC.
Meanwhile, according to INC insiders, Rahul Gandhi has decided to take the failures of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government to the country's voters ahead of general elections.
The INC believes there will be no infighting among its alliance partners over the post of prime minister if the alliance assumes majority in the parliament after the next polls. "Our first objective is to come together and throw out the BJP regime. Who would be the next prime minister, would be decided later on, once we have the numbers in the parliament," said the top INC functionary on the condition of not being quoted.
