BJP may win over 30 of 90 seats in C’garh polls: Survey

New Delhi: Chhattisgarh is most likely to experience a twist in the forthcoming Assembly elections; while the Congress is hoping for a clear edge, the BJP is claiming to give the Bhupesh Baghel-led Congress government a run for its money in the Assembly elections.

An internal survey conducted by the BJP has indicated that the party could bag over 30 of the 90 seats in the state, where corruption and anti-incumbency are going to be the main poll planks for the Opposition party.

According to the survey, it is learnt that the party is on a back foot on the chief ministerial candidate issue, which could be advantageous for the Congress. The soft-Hindutva approach of the  Baghel government is another worry for the BJP, but according to the survey, a focused approach to highlight corruption, including at local level, under the Congress rule can even turn the tables for the party.

BJP’s “poll mascot” Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who visited the state in July, is expected to visit the state again later this month.

During his last visit, PM Modi had lambasted the Baghel-led government  for rampant corruption and alleged that corruption was their “biggest ideology.”
While the BJP is unlikely to project a chief-ministerial candidate in the state, which it lost in 2018 after ruling the tribal dominated state for 15 years, the recent reshuffle in BJP president J.P. Nadda’s team with the accommodation of two new faces from Chattisgarh — Saroj Pandey and Lata Usendi as national vice presidents — were seen as part of the BJP’s strategy with an eye on the coming Assembly polls.

Former CM Raman Singh has already been a national vice-president in Mr Nadda’s team. While Dr Singh is Thakur, Ms Pandey and Ms Usendi are Brahmin and tribal respectively.

The BJP’s strategy to wrest the power from the Congress includes reaching out to maximum number of people in OBC dominated areas of the state, which had helped the Congress in ousting the 15-year-old rule of the BJP in 2018.

Incumbent chief minister Bhupesh Baghel is from the OBC community, a dominant caste. While OBCs are around 41 per cent, tribals are 30 per cent of the total population of the state.