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The challenge before today’s BJP is to find an agenda that captures public imagination again with fresh ideas with its own communication grammar
For a party that built its political dominance by making the Opposition answer its questions, this is an uncomfortable reversal. (AFP)
It was September 13, 2013. Flanked by then BJP president Rajnath Singh, Narendra Modi was formally declared the party’s prime ministerial candidate for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, more than six months before the country went to polls.
The announcement immediately put the Congress on the back foot. A party that traditionally avoided declaring its prime ministerial candidate ahead of elections suddenly found itself fielding questions about Rahul Gandhi versus Narendra Modi. Congress spokesperson Renuka Chowdhury’s response that very day was dismissive: “We simply cannot be bothered”. Yet, the issue had been festering, and Congress leaders, including former Chhattisgarh chief minister Ajit Jogi, began suggesting that Rahul Gandhi should lead the party into the election. The BJP had achieved something important—it had set the political agenda, and the Congress was left responding to it.
Just two days later, in his first electoral rally as NDA’s PM candidate at Haryana’s Rewari addressing ex-servicemen, Modi publicly promised implementation of One Rank, One Pension (OROP) if the BJP came to power. A long-standing demand of veterans became a prominent electoral issue after Modi’s intervention. This came out of the blue and the Congress government didn’t know how to react. Modi went on to raise this issue till 2014, including in his Sujanpur rally on February 17 that year just before election. The UPA government was forced to accept One Rank, One Pension (OROP) in principle in the interim budget, which made the BJP claim both vindication and victory.
For the last 12 years, the BJP has faced many challenges, with some sharp attacks from the Congress, which has been in opposition since 2014. But it has never let lose its grip over public narrative and who controls the public discourse.
In 2019, the BJP successfully moved the conversation from the Pulwama terror attack and Balakot air strikes to national security and leadership. The Opposition found it difficult to establish an alternative narrative.
Ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha poll, an over-confident Rahul Gandhi went to elections with a single agenda—alleged corruption in procurement of Rafale fighter jets that are now India’s assets. “Now the Supreme Court has made it clear that ‘chowkidar-ji’ (watchman) has committed a theft… I want to directly challenge that the Supreme Court has stated that you have indulged in corruption,” Gandhi infamously said, a statement for which he later had to tender an apology to the Supreme Court.
But in the thick of election, when a serious charge of this magnitude was made, PM Modi prefixed his social media handle with ‘Chowkidaar’ and asked his millions of followers to replicate him. Within hours, Gandhi’s efforts to tarnish the prime minister’s image boomeranged. BJP won 2019 with 303 seats.
However, 12 years on, BJP’s ability to dictate the discourse seem to have been on a waning.
The 2024 election offered a glimpse of a different BJP. Rahul Gandhi’s ‘Constitution Bachao’ campaign, particularly in Uttar Pradesh, gave the Opposition a potent political message. The BJP had to spend considerable political energy defending itself against the charge that it would change the Constitution and threaten reservations. However, its “Char Sau Paar” (more than 400 seats) campaign gave the Congress leg room to exploit the narrative, making the BJP lose 29 seats from the state and reducing its tally by nearly 47 per cent.
The party eventually won a third consecutive term, but its reduced majority showed that its narrative was no longer invincible.
The change has become more visible in 2026. The Opposition’s ‘Vote Chori’ campaign and its attacks over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls have pushed the Election Commission into the centre of political debate. The BJP’s argument that electoral rolls need cleaning up has struggled to displace the Opposition’s larger question about institutional credibility.
The BJP’s response itself is revealing. It has deployed Amit Shah, JP Nadda, Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Yogi Adityanath for nationwide counter-campaigns and padyatras. In Uttar Pradesh alone, six regional marches were organised between November 3 and 5.
The party is calling it the ‘Loktantra Bachao, Arajakta Hatao’ (Save Democracy, Remove Anarchy) campaign to challenge the opposition INDIA bloc. But the optics of the government’s key functionaries marching on the streets to “save democracy” appear much like a Congress response before 2014.
For the first time during the anti-NEET protest, the government was forced into a climbdown and sitting education minister Dharmendra Pradhan resigned, taking moral responsibility.
The BJP’s traditional communication formula increasingly and successfully relies on familiar ideological responses—nationalism, infiltration, alleged foreign interference and accusations of anti-Hindu politics. These remain powerful political instruments even today, particularly among its core supporters. But their effectiveness depends on the issue at hand.
When the debate concerns voter rights, unemployment, examination irregularities or supposed institutional credibility, ideological counter-attacks may not adequately address the underlying public anxiety. The BJP’s attempt to counter SIR-related resentment in UP by invoking illegal immigration is an example of this approach.
“Whenever an infiltrator – any Bangladeshi infiltrator or any Pakistani – gets their name included in the voter list, they are violating the rights of a poor person, a Dalit and the deprived people of India. To prevent this, it is absolutely necessary to remove their names from the voter list,” said Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Adityanath in a Gorakhpur rally on November 4.
It is not that the BJP has forgotten how to communicate. It is that the political environment has changed. In 2014, PM Modi represented aspiration and disruption against an exhausted establishment. In 2026, the BJP itself is the establishment.
For a party that built its political dominance by making the Opposition answer its questions, this is an uncomfortable reversal. The challenge before today’s BJP is not simply to produce a better counter-narrative. It is to find an agenda that captures public imagination again with fresh ideas with its own set of communication grammars. To broadcast them, BJP has the best of articulate faces, including Prime Minister Modi himself, who is adapting to vertical short reels and increased college visits to address the young and restless. But is the rest of the BJP leadership waking up and smelling the new reality?
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Ask News18The campaign is a nationwide counter-offensive launched by the BJP in response to the opposition INDIA bloc’s ‘Vote Chori’ campaign and attacks concerning the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls.
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Anindya Banerjee, Associate Editor brings over fifteen years of journalistic courage to the forefront. With a keen focus on politics and policy, Anindya has garnered a wealth of experience, with deep …Read More
November 06, 2026, 11:27 IST
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