Priyanka Gandhi campaigned on 31 seats, Congress lost 30 of those

Yesterday BJP witnessed the largest majority in Lok Sabha in the history of the party, with the party getting 303 seats out of the 543 parliamentary constituencies and NDA overall getting 353 seats. While there are several leaders one can attribute this thumping majority to, including Narendra Modi, Amit Shah, Smriti Irani, and others, there is one surprising element from the opposition clan whose ‘deeds’ has worked out in BJP’s favor- Congress’ Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.

The Gandhi daughter had been inducted into the party amidst much fanfare. It was being envisaged that appointing her as General Secretary of UP east will help achieve political wonders in the most crucial state of India, since Congress’ last performance had been abysmal. Congress had lost all but two seats in the state, which were the family bastions and it was felt that the party could not possibly sink lower. But it did. Under Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s watch, the party has lost their decades old family bastion of Amethi to Smriti Irani.

Among the UP seats where Priyanka campaigned and lost include, Daurarha, Barabanki, Unnao, Kanpur, Jhansi, Pratapgarh, Jaunpur, Kushi Nagar, Sultanpur, Bhadohi, Dumariaganj, Basti, Fatehpur and Sant Kabirnagar.

Apart from the failure in UP, Priyanka’s campaigning has failed in the other northern states of Punjab, Assam, Haryana, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, and Himachal Pradesh. In the total 12 seats in which she campaigned outside UP, Congress lost in 11, including, Silchar, Ambala, Hisar, Rohtak, North East Delhi, South Delhi, Ratlam, Indore, and Mandi.

In the total number of 31 seats campaigned, the party has lost 30 of them, bringing her success rate to 3%.

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s negative effect is so strong that even in their stronghold of Punjab, where the party won 8 seats out of 13; they lost the two seats of Bhatinda and Gurdaspur in which she campaigned.

Apart from campaigning for the constituencies, her other aim had been to cut the BJP vote share. In her own words, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra had stated, “each and every one of my candidate in UP is going to cute BJP’s vote share”. However, seeing as NDA has achieved 64 out of the 80 UP seats, she has failed on that front as well.

Priyanka was being viewed as the ‘Brahmastra against PM Modi’ by the dynast worshipping Congress members. They were hoping that the ‘blue blood’ will magically wave her hand and smile and the unsuspecting citizens will fall for the act. The results of the Lok Sabha elections however, have shown that the citizens have all but rejected the dynastic ideology of the party by ousting all the dynasts and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is no exception. Neither her ‘striking similarity to Indira Gandhi’ has worked, not her ‘fabled political acumen’. Perhaps next time round, the Congress can learn from their misdeeds and induct a ‘kaamdar’ instead of a ‘naamdar’.