The Pulwama terror attack and India’s reaction have certainly altered the political narrative.
Just a few hours after the Indian Air Force struck terrorist bases across the Line of Control on February 26, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was at his aggressive best as he addressed an election rally in Churu, Rajasthan. Amid loud cheers from the audience, Modi harked back to the pledge that he had taken in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections in 2014, and declared, “Saugandh mujhe hai is mitti ki, main desh nahi mitne dunga (I swear by the soil of this country that I will not allow this nation to perish).” He insisted that the nation was in safe hands.
While Modi did not make any direct reference to the retaliatory action to the Pulwama terrorist attack, the message was clear—that he has lived up to the reputation of being a strong and decisive leader who has the gumption to take bold measures, and that he is the only leader who can deal effectively with the challenges to the country’s security.
This was underlined by BJP president Amit Shah at a party event in Ghazipur, Uttar Pradesh, when he said that India could prove its might through air strikes only because of Modi. The government, he said, had shown zero tolerance to terrorists.
The political appropriation of the air strikes by Modi and the BJP is in no doubt, and the party realises that the scenario emerging from the terror attack in Pulwama has tremendous potential to alter the electoral narrative ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. With less than two months to the elections, the ruling party is expected to project Modi as a leader capable of taking bold actions to deal with challenges to national security, and a corollary of this would be that the opposition lacks a leader or a party with as strong a commitment towards national security. The emerging scenario is also in sync with the BJP’s claims of being a party committed to nationalistic ethos.
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