Lining up for BJP ahead of polls : Ticket to the Assembly ?
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: January 26, 2022 -

Ticket to the Assembly. The belief is a BJP ticket is the green card to enter the Assembly and this is the primary reason why there are so many intending BJP candidates in almost all the Assembly Constituencies.

And this is precisely the reason why so much interest has been generated just by the talks doing the round that the BJP Parliamentary Board has met at Delhi to discuss and decide who should be named as the party’s candidates in the coming Assembly election.

The enhanced security measures in and around the State BJP office at Nityaipat Chuthek has only added grist to the talks doing the round and it is this singular topic which has been dominating all discussions between close and not so close friends for the last few days, especially after the Congress and the NPP announced the first list of candidates.

Similar scenes could be the situation at some Assembly Constituencies, especially at Kakching and Thanga AC where the BJP has welcomed new entrants and what is happening at these Assembly Constituencies perhaps best explains the ‘race’ for the BJP’s ticket.

Whether this will bode well for the party in the election or not is something best left to the realm of speculation at the moment, but to many the race for the BJP’s ticket may appear to be some sort of a semi-final before the final, that is the actual voting day.

Such a reality is not something new to Manipur, and one just has to recall the days ahead of the 2012 Assembly election when numerous aspirants had lined up for the Congress ticket.

The common thread running through 2012 and 2022 is Delhi or more precisely which party is in power at the Centre.

The umbilical cord between the seats of power at Delhi and here at Imphal is a reality and this is a point which all political parties in Manipur should acknowledge.

The BJP list of candidates is expected to come out soon anytime now, and it would be interesting to see how those who have been left out react on being ‘spurned’.

This is where the understanding of Plan B becomes significant. And it would be interesting to see how Plan B of different intending BJP candidates plays out once the list of the candidates is issued.

Such a situation will become a reality soon anyday now and it will add to the masala in quite a number of Assembly Constituencies.

Will there be an ‘increase in the visibility’ of the intending BJP candidates if their application for the party’s ticket is not entertained ?

Or will it be a question of arriving at an agreement that the spurned intending candidates support the anointed BJP candidate ?

The presence of numerous intending BJP candidates in different Assembly Constituencies is an obvious indication of the progress the saffron party has made in the last 5 years here, but at the same time, this can also be to the detriment of the party.

What if the other ‘spurned’ intending candidates refuse to throw in the towel and instead contest the election on the ticket of any other political party ?

Wouldn’t this eat into the vote of the BJP candidate and thereby brighten the chances of the other candidate/s in the fray ?

This is a point which must have been discussed and thought over minutely during the meeting that was just held to discuss allotment of the party’s ticket but the fact that the problem of too many will haunt the BJP is a truism which cannot be wished away.

The race for the BJP’s ticket has only added to the drama ahead of the Assembly election and so even as numerous intending BJP candidates will be focused on who get the nod and who are left behind, it will also be equally interesting to see Plan B of all the intending candidates who have been left in the lurch.

The run up to the Assembly election has certainly lived up to the earlier expectations that the 2022 polls will not be lacking in drama and excitement.