Kozhikode: Senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor has said that it will be ‘impossible’ for the BJP to repeat its 2019 election victory in 2024. The Thiruvananthapuram MP, who was speaking at the Kerala Literature Festival here on Friday, said while he accepts the dominance of the BJP, it is also a fact that it has lost several states and it is not impossible to lose the central government. Is.
“If you see how well they (BJP) did in 2019, they essentially had every seat in Haryana, Gujarat, Rajasthan; OR All except one seat in Bihar, MP (Madhya Pradesh), Maharashtra; And Bengal had 18 seats. ,
“Now, it is impossible to repeat all those results and it is entirely possible to fall below the majority in 2024,” Tharoor said during a session titled ‘India @ 75: A Walk Through the Democratic Institutions’.
Terming the Pulwama attacks and Balakot strike, which he said caused a “tremendous wave” in the last minute – a “freak” that will not be repeated in 2024 – the 66-year-old said a drop of 50 for the BJP The seats and gains for the opposition parties are entirely “imaginable”.
However, on the crucial question of whether the opposition parties, which Tharoor predicted would defeat the BJP from its majority position, would stay together, he said it was “impossible to answer”.
“If BJP is on 250 and others are on 290… will those 290 agree or will BJP be able to choose from 20 and 10 parties here who want support from the current central government and then form the government,” he said. We don’t know,” he said.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP won 303 out of 543 seats, while the Congress could win only 52.
Talking about the challenges India faces after 75 years of independence, Tharoor, who despite admitting that dynasties in a democracy are a “challenge”, said those who split his party would also have to fight across the country. Must look.
He argued that, ironically, at the polar ends of the political spectrum, dynastic politics occurs in every party, with the sole exception of “the Communists and the BJP”.
“When we point fingers and say ‘Congress dynasty’… you look around the country and you see Mulayam Singh (Yadav) is the successor of his son Lalu Prasad Yadav, his successor after Karunanidhi. Son, Bal Thackeray is followed by his son Sharad Pawar.
One of Asia’s largest literary gatherings, the Kerala Literature Festival is hosting an eclectic mix of literary and culture icons ranging from Nobel laureates, Booker Prize winning authors, senior politicians to historians, film personalities, diplomats and artists.
The list of speakers includes 2022 Booker Prize winner Shehan Karunatilak, Nobel laureates Adah Yonath and Abhijit Banerjee, American Indologist Wendy Doniger, actor Kamal Haasan, children’s author Sudha Murthy and veteran singer Usha Uthup.