The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which had been in the opposition for ten years, started looking at methods to alter the party’s stance on political events and problems related to governance before to the 2014 general elections. Supported by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, an ideological pillar, some BJP leaders advocated dictating the agenda and forcing the opposition to react.
This aggressively pursued narrative that has helped the party become the dominant force in the politically significant “Hindi belt” over the last ten years has also allowed it to infiltrate the political discourse in areas where it has had little to no electoral success, such as Southern India.
With the exception of Karnataka, where it has held many elections, the party has been working to weaken the obstacles standing in the way of its growth in Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, and Kerala.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been actively courting people in Tamil Nadu by promising development. It has united many castes using the tried-and-true Hindutva formula, and it is now arousing feelings of pride in the region and the country.
The party’s unrelenting campaign of assigning blame for the transfer of Katchatheevu Island to Sri Lanka to the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), the party in power in Tamil Nadu, and the Congress-led UPA governments is part of its now-established strategy of establishing the agenda and attempting to be at the center of the political discourse.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is spearheading this campaign, spoke about the transfer of the island, which is 300 meters wide and 1.6 kilometers long, on the social media site “X” and was critical of the DMK and the Congress. Modi blasted the DMK for not standing up for the interests of Tamil Nadu and charged the party with applying “double standards” in this regard.
S Jaishankar, the minister of external affairs, intervened on Monday to support the campaign, highlighting the disdain shown towards the little island by previous prime ministers Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi. According to Jaishankar, Nehru gave the island “no importance,” and succeeding administrations did little to protect fishermen’s rights.Although the diplomatic community advises prudence, the BJP does not appear to be inclined to scale back its campaign. The previous foreign secretary, Jaishankar, displayed excellent diplomacy when he sidestepped queries about whether India will take legal action against the 1974 and 1976 accords that allowed for the island’s transfer and the giving up of fishing rights, stating that the issue was under appeal.
K Annamalai, the head of the state party in Tamil Nadu, on the other hand, was more combative. The notoriously combative former Indian Police Service officer asserted that the island ought to be returned since the national interest was harmed by the government’s decision to give it to Sri Lanka.
Will the BJP earn ground as a result of the controversy?
Speaking under anonymity, party sources concede that the issue may not pay off for the BJP in the near future because of its low popularity. But for the time being, it has accomplished what the party wanted: it has established the narrative and compelled the opposition to react.
By,HHM