By Amit Kumar, Twocircles.net
The Assam state elections results have made it clear that the Bharatiya Janata Party has decimated the incumbent Congress to end their 15-year reign and Sarbananda Sonowal will now be the first BJP Chief Minister in a north-eastern state.
Of the 126 seats, the BJP, in alliance with the Asom Gana Parishad and the Bodoland Popular Front, has won 86 seats, while AIUDF, with 14 seats, got four less than the previous elections.
It is precisely the kind of news that Badruddin Ajmal, the supremo of All India Union Democratic Front, had been dreading. The perfume baron had given his all in the recent elections, and for long, his party had believed that the anti-incumbency against the Congress would only improve its tally of 18 seats in the 2011 elections. Even days before the elections, there were reports that AIUDF had tried hard to work out an alliance with the Congress. However, AIUDF party members had told this correspondent during the election campaigning that there was no chance of an alliance with the Congress. Since they had been campaigning against Tarun Gogoi’s government, an alliance with them would antagonise their supporters. Ajmal had also categorically denied any alliance with the BJP and instead banked on the third front to sway votes in his favour.
When Ajmal, a sitting MP from Dhubri, said he would also contest elections from South Salmara, a number of people were surprised. But for Ajmal, who had until now gained in every election, this was a calculated move. While it was known by all that the BJP would be Congress’ toughest rival, AIUDF was hoping that it would be able to play the king maker’s role post-elections. It had hoped that the Congress would be able to grab at least 40-45 seats, in which case AIUDF’s seats would help them form a government and help Ajmal become at least he deputy CM, if not the Chief Minister.
All such calculations can now be put to rest: let alone becoming a king-maker, Ajmal lost in South Salmara to Congress candidate Wajed Ali Choudhury by 16,723 votes, and his prediction of winning 30-40 seats in the elections sounds more like a wish than a prediction. With less than 15 seats, the party has gone from being opposition’s largest party to now playing second-fiddle to Congress for the next five years in Assam.
If AIUDF was hoping that the Muslims in the state would vote for it, it was being complacent to say the least: take the case of regions in Lower Assam. In South Karimganj alone, there were 25 candidates, of which 23 were Muslims and even though AIUDF’s candidate, Aziz Ahmed Khan won this time, the message was clear: the AIUDF’s belief that all Muslims would vote for the party has hurt them bad.
Then, there was the question of Ajmal’s controversial remarks that did little to help their cause: in January, Hindustan Times had done a story which said that Ajmal had drawn flak for asking Muslims to combine and vote against Hindus. His remarks were condemned by many, including an umbrella body of seven Muslim organisations representing Assamese Muslims. They came down heavily on Ajmal for his remarks. Such comments did little to help their cause.
This, along with his often-confusing remarks on migrants, including comments like “if there are Bangladeshis in Assam, shoot them. But don’t harass genuine citizens of the country ” did little to assuage the fears of thousands of Muslims who are caught in the quagmire of proving their citizenships. As our story showed, the issue of citizenship has been an extremely contentious issue in the state and making statements like shoot the Bangladeshis is unlikely to have down well with a number of Muslim voters. Remember, there are families where a mother has been labelled a Bangladeshi while her son is an Indian citizen.
While AIUDF is sure to look into the reasons for its bad performance, the ambitions of Ajmal have surely taken a beating for the time being. It will be interesting to see what the party’s next strategy will be, the idea of being the king maker can be put to cold storage for now.