A hundred-day journey

They can live with poverty and betrayed promises of development, but they cannot live in a situation of perpetual conflict.

Madhya Pradesh: Several state ministers lose their seats — Supporters of India’s main opposition Congress party celebrate after initial poll results at the party headquarters in New Delhi, India, December 11, 2018. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi

Congress-mukt Bharat was always a chimera. The BJP, and particularly its two leaders, Mr Narendra Modi and Mr Amit Shah, tried to sell the fatuous idea that the Congress party can and will be wiped out of the electoral map of the country. The Congress rubbished the argument. Even the RSS distanced itself from the provocative slogan. The people of India, however, seem to have taken offence to the BJP’s plan.

When the opportunity arose, the electorate in the three states of Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh voted decisively in favour of the Congress, that was locked in a direct fight with the BJP. Readers may demur at the use of the word ‘decisively’, but I do so deliberately and after a careful analysis of the results.