Abstract
The Indian general elections occurred amid a widespread and severe agricultural crisis. Many analysts thought that this could have a substantial impact on the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) prospects to remain in office. This article, using post poll data, analyses the voting behaviour of two key sections of the electorate, the rural poor and the farmers. It shows that the BJP drew substantial support from both categories, across caste and class. Far from being a party of the urban upper classes and castes, the results of the 2019 elections mark the culmination of a decades-long process of ruralization and ‘proletarianization’ of the party.
Introduction
The results of the 2019 Indian general elections surprised most analysts, who had not predicted that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would secure an absolute majority again—and with an increased seat and vote shares. Most had predicted that the BJP would be the largest party, but very few thought it was possible for it to retain enough of the seats that it had won in 2014 and expand its support base to new areas. But the BJP managed to do just that, replicating its virtually total sweep in North and West India—despite a much more united opposition, particularly in the crucial state of Uttar Pradesh—and winning a considerably higher number of seats in the East and North East of the country.
The scale of the BJP victory is surprising particularly because economic conditions appeared far from favourable. GDP growth had slowed down in the months leading to the elections, Modi’s promise to create millions of jobs did not materialize—unemployment actually reached a 45-year high, according to official estimates (TET, 2019)—and the implementation of the Good and Service Tax and the demonetization of 86 per cent of the circulating cash in November 2016 negatively impacted small businesses and the informal economy, which employs the large majority of the population. Furthermore, there have been several large-scale farmers’ protests during Modi’s term, signalling widespread rural distress. In fact, resentment in the countryside is thought to be a key reason behind the far from spectacular performance of the BJP at the 2017 elections in Gujarat (Ramani & Radhakrishnan, 2017) and the defeat of Modi’s party in the three Hindi belt states of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, which were held just 6 months before the 2019 general elections (Sircar, 2018). Also, a large pre-poll survey conducted in late 2018 found that the performance of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government on themes related to agriculture—as well as on all the issues investigated by the survey—was deemed unsatisfactory by a majority of the voters (IndiaSpend, 2019).
The resounding victory of the BJP is thus surprising, not only because it occurred amid economic uncertainty and on the face of high expectations that were hardly met, but also because research had shown that Indian voters, over the last few years, had increasingly rewarded good economic performance, at least at the state level (Vaishnav & Swanson, 2015). Rather, the results of 2019 remind those of 5 years before when the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government suffered a brutal defeat, despite the fact that it had ensured record economic growth and poverty reduction and it had also ensured remarkable improvements in many human development indicators (Maiorano & Manor, 2017).
In this article, I look at the support of the BJP in rural areas. More specifically, I look at two important social groups that form a sizable part of India’s rural society: farmers and the rural poor (in particular, the agricultural labourers). Using post-poll survey data (NES, 2019) collected by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), I show that the BJP performed exceptionally well in rural areas, in particular among people whose livelihoods directly depend on agriculture. I also show that the 2019 elections can be seen as the culmination of two processes that have been unfolding over the last three decades. The first is the ruralization of the BJP. The second is the ‘proletarianization’ of the party, as it has been steadily made inroads into the lower classes and castes. Overall, the 2019 election results clearly show that it is time to abandon the image of the BJP as a party of the urban upper classes and castes.
In the next section, I will briefly discuss the extent of rural distress and the government response. In the following section, I will analyse voting behaviour in rural areas, with special focus on farmers and agricultural labourers. The last section concludes and speculates on the reasons why the BJP was able to win widespread support from rural areas, despite far from favourable economic conditions.
Agrarian Distress and Government Response
Agrarian distress is not Modi’s creation. India’s agriculture has been engulfed in a decades-long crisis as a combination of declining public investments, climate change and growing unpredictability of the monsoon, lack of availability of institutional credit, fragmentation of landholdings across generations, international price volatility and lack of reform (Himanshu, 2019; Suri, 2006).
During Modi’s term, however, India’s agrarian crisis deepened, especially if compared to the tenure of the UPA governments (2004–2014). Three macro-economic indicators show the extent of agrarian distress in recent years. First, the nominal Gross Value Added (GVA) of agriculture—a good measure of people’s well-being in the primary sector—collapsed over the last 5 years, while the non-agricultural nominal GVA has gone up. This translated into a worsening of the terms of trade for that section of the population that is directly dependent on agriculture for their livelihoods (about 44% of the population) (Kishore, 2019).
However, this does not mean that the agricultural sector has not grown: in fact, the GVA at constant prices has grown by an average of 2.9 per cent a year, which is lower than what was achieved during the UPA terms (3.7% per year), but still relatively robust (Gulati, 2019). But the fact that nominal agricultural GVA has grown in single digit for most of the last 5 years (Damodaran, 2019) and has grown less than real GVA—indicating deflation of agricultural produce prices—in the months preceding the elections indicates that farmers’ income has grown very slowly.
Second, and relatedly, food inflation collapsed. While this benefited both urban consumers and the rural poor, particularly small and marginal farmers that do not sell agricultural surpluses on the market and agricultural labourers, it also caused a severe deterioration of farmers’ income (Himanshu, 2019). The Wholesale Price Index (WPI) for primary food items showed remarkable fluctuations, turning negative for several months preceding the general elections. Over the 5 years of the Modi-led government, the WPI for food articles increased by 15.7 per cent. Between 2005 and 2012, by contrast, the WPI had increased by 120 per cent, 1 thus creating the opposite political economy problem for the UPA, as high food inflation hurt consumers, while benefiting farmers. Agricultural markets were also negatively impacted by the shock of demonetization, which is likely to have caused a further decline in farm pro- duct prices (Karnik, 2017). According to a World Bank study (Beyer, Chhabra, Galdo, & Rama, 2018) that used satellite data to assess the effects of demonetization on economic activity, the impact was much more severe in rural areas, although short term.
Third, real wages of agricultural labourers—who constitute the bulk of the rural poor—stagnated, especially if compared to the very healthy growth seen over the previous decade. Between October 2007 and October 2013, real rural wages’ growth was about 7 per cent per year, on average. After November 2014 (until October 2018), the rate of growth dropped below 2 per cent per year (Kundu, 2018). This is also (partly) a consequence of low inflation, which helped keep wages low (and prevented an erosion of labourers’ purchasing power). For large farmers who employ substantial labour, low pressures on wages certainly helped mitigating the effects of low prices for their agricultural products. Finally, India saw two successive droughts in 2014 and 2015.
During Modi’s term, there have been several farmers’ protests across the country, of two main types. First, there have been protests centred on economic issues such as debt waivers, demands for remunerative procurement prices and better crop insurance schemes. Second, agricultural castes in several parts of India—most notably Jats in Haryana, Patidars in Gujarat and Maratha in Maharashtra—asked for reservations in public sector jobs and educational institutions. This is as much a sign of rural as well as urban distress, because the request for reservations largely stems from the inability of youth belonging to traditionally dominant landowning castes to find jobs outside agriculture, considered to be unprofit- able and incapable of granting the status that their parents enjoyed in the past. In fact, according to the CSDS State of Indian Farmers Report (CSDS, 2014) as many as 69 per cent of the farmers think that the urban economy offers better prospects and 60 per cent would like their children to settle in a city.
The scale and frequency of farmers’ protests captured the attention of virtually all political parties, including the BJP, which was quick to respond to their grievances, albeit partially.
In fact, after not paying particular attention to agriculture during the first years of its tenure, the government quickly changed track in the wake of the protests and of the disappointing results in some of the state elections, particularly in Gujarat in 2017—where the BJP barely obtained a majority—and later in the three Hindi belt states of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, where the BJP lost to the Congress party. In all these cases, rural distress seemed to have played a significant role.
Budgetary allocations to the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare reflected the shifting policy priority of the government (Table 1).
Budgetary Allocations to the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare
It should be noted that the doubling of the budgetary allocation in 2016/2017 is largely due to the fact that the heading for the interest on subsidies for short-term credit to farmers—amounting to ₹15,000 crores, or 67 per cent of the increased allocation—was moved from the Finance Ministry to the Agriculture Ministry. Still, in the last part of the term, the government clearly decided to increase spending in agriculture significantly, particularly during the year preceding the elections.
A big push to agricultural expenditure came from the decision, taken in December 2018, to introduce the PM-Kisan scheme, a cash transfer programme for small farmers, granting ₹6,000 per family per year. Clearly, this became the government’s number one priority, considering that as many as five crore families 2 received the first instalments before the elections, just a few months after the announcement. This reinforced Prime Minister Modi’s image as an effective administrator that can ‘get things done’.
Shortly before the elections, the government also increased steeply the Minimum Support Price (MSP) for the Kharif crops, after years of virtual stagnation (Table 2).
MSP of Major Crops 2014–2019
Even though higher MSPs do not benefit the great majority of the farmers—experts estimate around 10–15 per cent of the total, and highly concentrated in a few states (Gulati & Juneja, 2019)—and even though the government did not accommodate the request to include rental value of land and interest on invested capital in the calculation of production costs (Hussain, 2018), a hike in MSP does send a political signal that the government is responding to farmers’ grievances, especially those who are part of unions or associations (who are also those who are more political active and more likely to mobilize).
Finally, the government introduced, in January 2019, reservations in government jobs and educational institutions for economically weaker sections of castes not covered by existing reservations. This in many ways addressed one of the key demands of caste-based farmers’ protests, again reinforcing Modi’s image as a leader that ‘gets things done’. In fact, according to CSDS post-poll data, 78.7 per cent of the Patidars in Gujarat, 81.4 per cent of the Marathas in Maharashtra and 84.8 per cent of the Jats in Haryana either fully or somewhat supported the government’s decision. 3
With regard to the other social group on which this article focusses, the rural poor, the BJP-led govern- ment adopted a somewhat contradictory approach. On the one hand, the government tried to distance itself from the UPA rights-based approach to social policy and attempted to downscale existing policies. For instance, the government attempted to downscale the UPA’s flagship programme, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) (Maiorano, 2014), although it then abandoned the proposal. Budgetary allocations almost doubled in nominal terms—from ₹33,000 crore in 2014/2015 to ₹61,000 crore in 2018/2019 (Kapur & Paul, 2019), although in real terms the increase is not that dramatic—and evidence shows that the budget is still insufficient to meet the demand for employment under the programme. It is nevertheless significant that the government chose to keep the programme alive and to ensure a decent level of implementation. In fact, the average number of days of work per year provided to the programme’s beneficiaries did not change much (around 46/year) since the last years of the UPA government. 4
Similarly, the government proposed dismantling the Public Distribution System (PDS) (through which food is procured and distributed to beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act, NFSA) and called for the introduction of a cash transfer programme instead (Rukmini, 2015), but eventually dropped the proposal. Many states were also rather slow at implementing the NFSA, but today, according to government data, 99 per cent of the beneficiaries are currently covered under the Act (MCAFPD, 2018). The Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) was also threatened when the government halved its budgetary allocations in 2015/2016, even though the cuts were partially reversed the same year. While allocations declined significantly in real terms—nominal expenditure increased slightly from ₹16,562 crore in 2014/2015 to ₹17,890 crore in 2018/2019 (Kapur & Shukla, 2019)—the programme maintained acceptable levels of implementation. In short, much of the welfare infrastructure inherited from the previous government remained in place, despite the apparent reluctance of the government to continue implementing the UPA’s flagship programmes during its first 2 years in office.
More significant from a political point of view was the introduction of a number of schemes that provided private or public goods to the rural poor. In some cases, these schemes were a re-designed (or, sometimes, merely re-branded) version of existing polices. The provision of private goods regarded four main areas: housing, sanitation, households’ goods and financial inclusion. The government launched the Pradhan Mantri Awaas Yojana—Gramin (PMAY-G), a reformed and expanded version of the Indira Awas Yojana (IAY), that aimed at building a ‘pucca’ (bricks and cement) house for 1 crore 5 rural residents. Between 2014/2015 and 2017/2018, 52 lakh houses have been completed and 37 lakh are currently under construction. 6
Similarly, the government expanded existing sanitation programmes with the introduction of the Swachh Bharat mission on 2 October 2014. One of its key objectives was to make India open-defecation free within 5 years, chiefly through the construction of household latrines. Official data show that the government made a significant effort to increase toilet construction and, to date, 9.6 crore household toilets have been built under the mission, something that might be life-changing, especially for women.
Quite important for women was also the launch of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY), which provides a free LPG connection to all poor rural households. This is an important safety issue for women, whose great majority utilize harmful fuel to cook. The government claims that more than 7.2 crore LPG connections have been released, although research shows that many families struggle to afford LPG cylinders, thus limiting the impact of the scheme (Dabadge, Sreenivas, & Josey, 2015). However, the scale of the programme and the potential benefits are not to be underestimated in their political impact.
The government also made financial inclusion a key priority and, according to official data, opened more than 33 crore bank accounts through the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), a reformed version of the UPA’s financial inclusion programme. While the scheme is not free from problems and it actually created new hurdles for beneficiaries of welfare programmes—especially as a result of its integration with Aadhar (Khera, 2019)—it also streamlined implementation of some schemes and provided a bank account to virtually every household that did not have one.
Among the private goods provided to the poor, it should be mentioned the Ayushman Bharat, or ‘Modicare’ as it was soon called by the BJP’s propaganda machine. While it is doubtful that the health insurance scheme could have had any real impact given the extremely limited financial resources allocated to the scheme (Dreze, 2018), it received an immense publicity in the media and through the BJP party organization.
Public goods provision mainly covered two areas: roads and electrification. In both cases, the government continued (and partially reformed) existing programmes to provide all-weather roads and electri- city connections. While the government’s claims that 91 per cent of the country’s habitations are now connected to roads and that all the villages in the country are electrified are seriously questionable (Alexander & Padmanabhan, 2019), it remains that there has been an effort to streamline implementation with some tangible results. And, again, the results, real of inflated as they might be, were repeated incessantly by the BJP’s propaganda apparatus.
Overall, the government managed to provide substantial benefits to the rural population, despite adverse economic conditions and the failure to tackle the roots of agrarian distress. Poor rural households benefited from a variety of programmes that delivered a large number of tangible benefits—houses, roads, electricity, LPG connections, toilets and bank accounts. None of these schemes was perfect and most of the (highly publicized) government achievements are probably inflated; but it remains that, overall, these schemes did provide substance to the carefully constructed image of the Modi as a ‘developmental’ prime minister. They also contributed to the idea that development is for all, irrespective of one’s caste or party affiliation, as distribution and implementation were highly centralized and followed rigid and neutral policy guidelines, rather than local-level political considerations.
Farmers, on the other hand, while keep struggling for a number of structural reasons that were not seriously tackled by the government, did see some policy response to their grievances. This might have been sufficient to convince farmer-voters that Modi, although not possessing a magic wand that could transform agriculture into a highly profitable economic activity, at least did try to address some of their problems.
This is not to argue that the farmers or the rural poor had strong economic reasons to give the government another chance. But, on the one hand, their economic conditions did not deteriorate; rather, it improved more slowly than during the 2004–2014 decade. Post-poll survey data show that a sizable part of the rural population—39 per cent—thought that the economic condition of their household improved over the years of the Modi government (Table 3).
Answers to the Question ‘As Compared to 5 Years ago, How Is the Economic Condition of Your Household Today?’, by Class and Locality
While the table shows that the perception of the change in one’s economic condition improves when we climb the class ladder and when we go from rural to urban areas, it remains that these figures collide with macroeconomic indicators and with the narrative of widespread rural distress. If we focus on agricultural classes’ perception of their own economic conditions, the gap between narrative and survey data is equally striking (Table 4). It should be noted that the category of ‘agricultural classes’ includes big and small farmers, tenant cultivators and agricultural labourers.
Answers to the Question ‘As Compared to 5 Years Ago, How Is the Economic Condition of Your Household Today?’, Agricultural Classes vis-à-vis Others
Overall, while a difficult 5 years for the rural world, it seems that rural distress did not translate into a worsening of the economic conditions of the great majority of the rural population, including those whose livelihoods depend directly on agriculture. Furthermore, the implementation of a number of policies that provided tangible benefits to a large section of the rural poor—and the unprecedented publicity that these schemes received in both traditional and social media—did resonate with the developmental agenda that the BJP had put forward in 2014. Coupled with an exceptional party organization, incommensurable financial resources and great deal of support from the media, the BJP’s efforts to win the vote of rural India did pay off, as we will see in the next section.
Voting in Rural India
The BJP performed exceptionally well in rural areas. Table 5 is constructed using a dataset complied by Mohit Kumar from the Trivedi Centre for Political Data at Ashoka University. It maps census (2011) data onto constituencies’ borders and includes data on labourers engaged in agricultural activities. In the follo- wing tables, I use the following definitions: (a) URBAN10: this is a constituency where the proportion of agricultural labourers plus cultivators is below 10 per cent of the total population; (b) AGRI20, AGRI30, AGRI40: a constituency where the proportion of agricultural labourers and cultivators is above 20, 30 and 40 per cent, respectively; and (c) RURBAN 10–20, 10–30, 10–40: a constituency where the proportion of agricultural labourers and cultivators is between 10 and 20, 30 and 40 per cent, respectively. The dataset thus let me analyse the BJP’s performance in different types of constituencies, on the basis of the proportion of people who are directly engaged in agriculture. Table 5 shows the BJP’s strike rates (SR) (i.e. the proportion of seats that the party won out of those that it contested) and the party’s vote share in the constituencies that it contested (VS) for the last three general elections.
BJP’s SR and VS in Different Types of Constituencies, 2009–2019
Table 5 shows clearly a few interesting things. First, irrespective of the definition of agricultural constituencies, the BJP’s SR and VS are higher, across elections, in agricultural constituencies, than in urban ones. Second, the BJP’s VS and SR increase across all types of constituencies, between each election, but by far the greater increase occurs between 2009 and 2014. Third, if we focus on agricultural constituencies only (AGRI20, 30, 40), the VS of the BJP increases as we restrict the definition of agricultural constituency, i.e. the higher the number of people whose livelihoods depend on agriculture, the higher the BJP’s vote share. This does not hold for 2019, but the result is largely influenced by the extremely low vote share of the BJP in the constituencies where it was not competitive at all (mainly in states such as Andhra Pradesh and Telangana). In Table 6, I recalculate the BJP’s VS only for the constituencies where the party was competitive, defined as those where it ended in the first three positions.
BJP’s VS in Different Types of Constituencies Where It Was Competitive, 2009–2019
In these constituencies where the BJP was competitive, the trend is similar: the higher the proportion of labour engaged in agriculture, the higher the VS of the BJP, with the exception of highly rural constituencies (AGRI40) in 2019. Similarly, the more ‘rural’ a RURBAN constituency is, the higher the VS for the BJP.
These results are both in contrast and consistent with existing work on the BJP. On the one hand, they challenge the idea that the BJP is a party that is stronger in urban, rather than in rural areas. Previous analyses have consistently showed that the party performed better in urban, rather than rural constituencies (Auerbach, 2015). However, these analyses are based on definitions of urban constituencies that do not take into account the type of workers in each constituency. In fact, one large pre-poll survey conducted before the 2014 elections, showed similar support for the BJP from rural as well as urban voters (Vaishnav, Kapur, & Sircar, 2014), while analyses of the NES 2014 show that the urban–rural divide in the BJP’s support has been narrowing over the last few elections (Jaffrelot & Kumar, 2015). On the other hand, consistently with trends already noticed since the late 1990s, the BJP has steadily been expanding its support base beyond its traditional strongholds among urban/upper caste voters, making significant inroads into rural areas and among lower caste voters (Suri & Verma, 2017; Yadav, Kumar, & Heath, 1999). The data presented above (and the data discussed below) suggest that the 2019 elections are a continuation of existing trends, pointing at the gradual ruralization and ‘proletarianization’ of the BJP.
In fact, data from the NES 2019 suggest that the BJP has been making significant inroads among rural voters, across classes and castes. Table 7 looks at the BJP’s support in rural and urban areas over the last two elections, disaggregated by class.
BJP Support Class-Wise in Rural and Urban Areas, 2009–2019
As the table clearly shows, in rural areas, the BJP draws higher levels of support, the higher the economic status of the voter. While this is not surprising, given the historical strength of the party among the wealthiest sections of the society, what is striking is the exceptionally high increase in support for the BJP among the rural (as well as the urban) poor.
It is also significant that the support for the party is overall higher in rural rather than urban areas. This is also confirmed by analyses of the winning margins of the BJP in rural/urban areas, which were higher in more rural constituencies (Sircar, 2019). 7 Also interesting is the fact that voters in the middle of the class spectrum (lower and middle classes) are more likely to vote for the BJP in rural, rather than urban areas. This suggests a consolidation of the rural ‘neo-middle classes’ behind the BJP, a process already noted during the 2014 elections (Jaffrelot, 2015; Jaffrelot & Kumar, 2015).
We will now turn to voting behaviour of farmers and agricultural labourers more specifically. Table 8 shows how agricultural classes voted (as compared to all other voters) and also offers a class breakdown.
The table clearly shows the robust support that the BJP enjoys among agricultural classes (which, it should be remember, include big and small farmers, tenant cultivators and agricultural labourers). Whereas there is a clear class element that shapes voters’ preferences—the lower the class, the lower the preference for the BJP—it remains that the saffron party was the preferred choice of a very large number of people who depend on agriculture for their livelihood, irrespective of their class. Even for the ‘poor’ and ‘lower’ agricultural classes, the BJP’s figures are only marginally lower the party’s actual vote share nationally (37.36%). Furthermore, across class categories, agricultural classes were more likely to vote for the BJP than other voters in their respective class. This is in contrast with the results of the 2014 elections, when agricultural classes were less likely to prefer the BJP as compared with other voters (albeit only slightly, see last rows of Table 8).
Agricultural Classes’ Vote as Compared to Other Voters, by Class
Table 9 breaks down the farming community by the size of the voters’ landholdings and let us look at the voting behaviour of agricultural labourers specifically.
Agricultural Classes’ Vote by Landholding Size
The table confirms that the BJP won a considerable amount of votes among the farming community, irrespective of the size of their landholding. However, the table also confirms that the BJP’s support is lower (although still considerably high) among agricultural labourers and exceptionally high among big farmers. This again suggests that class is an important element that shaped the vote for the BJP. It should also be noted that the support for ‘others’ increases when going down the farming community’s class ladder, whereas the support for the Congress does not vary much.
Table 10 compares the BJP support among the farmers between 2014 and 2019.
BJP Support Among Farmers, 2014–2019
The BJP increased its support among all agricultural classes, but clearly the biggest inroads were made at the extreme of the class ladder, among agricultural labourers and big farmers.
If we break down the farming community by caste, a somewhat similar picture emerges. Table 11 shows voting behaviour of the agricultural classes as compared to others, disaggregated by caste.
Agricultural Classes’ Vote, by Caste
As can be clearly seen from the table, SCs are much less likely to vote for the BJP. Given that, although not perfectly, caste and class tend to overlap (Deshpande & Ramachandran, 2019), this seems to reinforce the argument that class was in fact an important element in determining the BJP’s support. However, the STs figures somewhat challenge this picture, given that the STs are among the most deprived sections of India’s society. In fact, they supported the BJP in high numbers. Given the massive gains of the BJP among STs during the 2014 elections as well (Mishra, 2014), it seems that the party has been actively trying to reach out to the community over a long-term strategy that is paying off.
In any case, as Table 12 shows, while the BJP increased its support among all agricultural classes, irrespective of caste, the larger gains have been among SCs and OBCs.
Agricultural Classes’ Support for the BJP by Caste, 2014–2019
Overall, the data presented so far unequivocally show that the BJP’s performance was in a significant way due to the increased support it received from the lower castes and classes in rural areas. One argument that many analysts made trying to explain the 2019 election result is that the social policies introduced by the government (discussed in section 2) were crucial to win the votes of the weakest sections of the society. Table 13 looks at voting preferences among social policies’ beneficiaries.
BJP Support Among Social Policy Beneficiaries
Table 13 shows that the policies most strongly associated with the BJP and the Prime Minister—Ayushman Bharat, PM-Kisan, UY and JDY—and that were a key element of the BJP’s electoral campaign, do seem to have had some impact, particularly among women voters (Attri & Jain, 2019). This might also be due to their ‘novelty’. Previous research on the MGNREGA showed a similar effect: voters rewarded the Congress government at the elections following the introduction of the programme (2009), but then the effect disappeared, most likely because of implementation problems that were not immediately evident, and because of the lack of the ‘novelty’ effect (Zimmermann, 2015). Similarly, policies that have been implemented for a long time such as the MGNREGA, the various pension programmes, the PDS and the housing scheme do not seem to have made a difference. In any case, as can be seen from the last column, even those who did not benefited from these schemes were still very likely to vote for the BJP anyway. It should be noted that the figure for the PM-Kisan scheme underestimates the effect it might have had on the support for the BJP. When only farmers are taken into account, as many as 56 per cent of those who gave credit to the central government for the scheme voted for the BJP. On the other hand, ‘only’ 30 per cent of the farmers who credited the state government voted for the saffron party (Pandey & Rana, 2019). However, one should not exaggerate the importance of policy on voting behaviour: more than half of the surveyed voters in rural areas (57%) could not name a policy ‘that they liked the most’ implemented by the Modi government.
Conclusions
The data presented in this article show that the BJP was able to consolidate and significantly expand its support base in rural areas—and in particular among voters whose livelihoods depend directly on agriculture—continuing a twin process of ruralization and ‘proletarianization’ of the party.
On the one hand, the BJP performed exceptionally well in rural areas. This is significant, especially considering the difficult economic conditions that deepened a decades-long agrarian crisis. While a sizable part of the rural population thought that their economic conditions has improved over the last 5 years, it remains that Modi certainly did not bring about the ‘achhe din’ that it had promised in 2014. However, through a combination of policies that provided tangible benefits to a large section of the society and increased commitment to the welfare of farmers during the last phase of his first term, the Prime Minister did appear to respond to agrarian distress. One should not forget that economic considerations are just one of the factors that shape voters’ behaviour. As Varshney wrote in the 1990s, there is no reason to believe that farmers necessarily give precedence to their farming interests (Varshney, 1993) over other factors, such as their ethnic identity, sense of nationalism or leadership preferences. In fact, just 5 per cent of the farmers mentioned farming-related issues as their top priorities when casting their vote (Pandey & Rana, 2019).
On the other hand, the results of the 2019 elections also show that the rural poor voted for the BJP in great numbers—continuing a process of gradual ‘proletarianization’ of the party. While there is no reason to believe that the poor necessarily put their economic interests above other types of considerations when casting their vote, it remains that a growing number of lower caste/classes voters have supported the BJP over the last three elections, a party strongly associated with the urban, upper classes and castes. Tariq Thachil (2014) explained this paradox arguing that the poor benefit from the range of social services that the BJP’s mother organization, the RSS, and other affiliated organizations provide. While this certainly continues to play a role, it is also clear that an alternative explanation ruled out by Thachil for the 2004 elections, might be more relevant today. This is that the BJP might have shifted its programmatic priorities—putting more and more emphasis on welfare schemes—in a way that benefit the poor, along with its traditional support base among the better offs.
Overall, however, it seems reasonable to believe that non-economic factors heavily shaped voting behaviour, in rural as well as urban areas. The most important among them is Modi’s leadership, popularity and charisma. This has not had only a direct effect on the voters themselves—about a third of the NDA voters said that they would have not voted the way they did, had Modi not been the Prime Minister candidate (NES, 2019)—but also on the BJP’s organization, attracting large numbers of ‘vote mobilizers’ (Chhibber & Ostermann, 2014) that campaign for the party and let its message and propaganda to penetrate deeply among the electorate. Other factors that can explain the massive mandate for the BJP—in rural as well as urban areas—are the BJP’s unparalleled financial resources—according to the Association for Democratic Reform the party secured about 95 per cent of the newly introduced electoral bonds—and a strong backing from the media.
Additionally, the opposition was not able to capitalize on the Modi’s government disappointing performance on the economy especially in terms of job creation and agrarian distress. This was not only true for the Congress party—which marginally increased its seat share, while maintaining its vote share—but also for regional parties, many of which claim to represent the interests of the farmers and/or the lower classes and castes. In fact, the combined vote share of regional parties declined for the first time since 1999 (losing about 3 percentage points between 2014 and 2019) (Ranjan, 2019).
Finally, a structural change that is probably playing in favour of the BJP is the blurring of the lines between urban and rural India. The increasing pace of urbanization; the existence of better infrastructures and transportation links between rural and urban areas; the diversification of the sources of income of many farmers into the urban economy; and the expansion of temporary migration by rural dwellers to urban areas are all factors that make rural voters more and more connected to the urban world. This might also help explain the convergence of urban and rural voters’ behaviour in favour of the BJP.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Anirudh Srivathsan, Nathanael Lee Yong Jian and Vani Swarupa Murali for excellent research assistance, Vibha Attri for providing the NES tables and K. C. Suri and an anonymous reviewer for their comments. All remaining errors are mine.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.