When Narendra Modi stood up to address the Lok Sabha on February 5, the prime minister exuded an aura of confidence and assuredness. He even mocked the members seated in the Opposition benches, saying they would be occupying those seats for decades. He asserted that in the upcoming general election, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will win 370 seats on its own, 98 more than the 272 needed for a simple majority in the Lok Sabha. He put the overall tally of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) at an astounding 405 seats. With a flourish, he said, “Ab ki baar…” And, as he paused, BJP members in the House filled in the rest, “Char sau paar”. And so the target of 400 seats was set.
That’s an electoral feat only Rajiv Gandhi, riding a sympathy wave triggered by the assassination of his mother Indira Gandhi, then prime minister of India, accomplished in 1984, when he led the Congress to a mammoth 404-seat majority in the general election. The Grand Old Party later added 10 more seats in the delayed polls in Assam and Punjab. Modi is also aware that if he wins three consecutive Lok Sabha elections with a clear majority, he will equal the record of Rajiv’s grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru,. The country’s first prime minister led the Congress to consecutive wins with full majorities in the 1952, 1957 and 1962 general elections before his death in 1964.
The results of the latest INDIA TODAY-CVoter bi-annual Mood of the Nation (MOTN) poll strongly validate Modi and the BJP’s optimism. The survey predicts that they are all set for a momentous hat-trick. Were an election held now, the poll gives the BJP 304 seats, a comfortable 32 more than the 272 needed for a simple majority and one more than the actual number the party won in the 2019 general election. The BJP-led NDA gets 335 seats, a drop of 18 from its 2019 tally of 353. These numbers are an improvement, though, over the August 2023 edition of the survey, which gave the BJP 287 seats and the NDA a mere 306 seats. Tellingly, the BJP’s tally has been showing a steady increase since the lowest figure of 269 seats in its
