PM Modi’s rant at Wardha leaves his audience cold

Wardha, in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra, was probably not the best of places to evoke a Hindu-Muslim divide.

Narendra Modi addressed his first rally in the region on Monday, April 1, and slammed into Congress president Rahul Gandhi for choosing to contest a second seat this Lok Santa election from Waynad in Kerala.

Moreover, Wardha is a Gandhian town. Vinoba Bhave started the Sarvodaya movement from here, his ashram at Paonar still propagates Gandhian values. Mahatma Gandhi's Sevagram ashram still starts its day with ‘Ishwar Allah Tero Naam, Sabko Sanmati de Bhagwan'.

There has never been a communal riot in this town and no war, even in 1965 or 1971m has ever disturbed its peace and tranquillity.

But oblivious of history and context, the Prime Minister said Gandhi was contesting from a Hindu minority constituency (he was misinformed because Waynad has 49.8 percent Hindu majority population, the rest split between various other communities, including Christians and Muslims) because he was afraid Hindus would defeat him for his pro-minority policies.

The rant left the people of Wardha cold. To begin with the attendance at the rally was poor. This is the cotton heartland of Maharashtra and farmers were expecting something more for themselves. The last time in 2014, Modi's Wardha rally was packed out because he had been promising farmers double the support price for their produce.

In the past five years there has been no minimum support price even for their crops. Farmers suicides have continued, the loan waivers forced out of the state government, also led by the BJP, have either not been implemented in some districts at all or, if implemented, has not benefited all farmers and benefited some only partially.

So national security is a far-away thing for its people who are more concerned with bread and butter issues this election season. According to political analysts, Modi may have thus done more harm than good to his party candidate in Wardha, sitting MP Ramdas Tadas.

In fact, most of the Shiv Sena and BJP candidates are sitting MPs, being repeated in the ten constituencies of Vidarbha (which go to polls in the first and second phases on April 11 and 18), for the third if not fourth time.

The only exception is Bhandara-Gondia which was won by Nana Patole in 2014 against Praful Patel of the Nationalist Congress Party. Patole then broke from the BJP for its anti-farmer policies and is now contesting from Nagpur on a Congress ticket.

There is a voter-ennui with these candidates and the anti-incumbency being faced by both the Union and state governments is getting in the way of the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance, which had swept all 10 seats in 2014. The parties are also facing rebellion among the ranks of their own party workers for failing to give new and fresher faces a chance.

According to most estimates thus, despite the Congress and the NCP too repeating tired old faces in some constituencies, the region stands evenly divided between the two alliances a week ahead of the first phase of voting on April 11.