The political discourse and direction of India in 2019 were determined and dictated by two individuals-Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah, who also happens to be the president of BJP, the party in power at the Centre and in 15 states across the country. From Kargil to Kanyakumari and from Kutch to Kohima, the impact of their political decisions was felt across the length and breadth of India. A mammoth tally of 303 seats in the Lok Sabha and a near-majority in the Rajya Sabha-along with allies and fence-sitting parties-ensured that the duo could translate their ideological will and political ambition into legislative action without facing any effective resistance from opposition parties.

And yet, 2020 begins on a sombre note for this power couple. The last month of 2019 witnessed nationwide protests-mostly spontaneous and led by the youth-against the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) 2019. With political support from opposition parties, the public disquiet about the law is unlikely to disappear anytime soon. Coupled with the CAA is the confusion and orchestrated objection to the nationwide National Register of Citizens (NRC)-an idea Shah reiterated for most of 2019 with electoral dividend in mind. That extra push backfired and the unimaginable and unprecedented happened-Modi publicly contradicted the assertions of his most trusted deputy of decades and distanced himself from the NRC, saying that his government had never had any discussion about conducting that exercise across the country. What added to the difficult times for the duo was the BJP's defeat in the Jharkhand Assembly elections in the last week of December. In the past one year, it was the fifth state to slip out of the saffron party's control.

Already on the backfoot, the first big challenge of 2020 for the Modi government will come in February from two fronts-economic and political. It's now an accepted fact that India's economy is in the doldrums, with immediate and effective interventions required from the Union government to put it back on track. So far, the Modi government's corrective measures have failed to yield any tangible results and, therefore, all eyes will be on the Budget, to be presented on February 1. While political debates over the passage of the CAA, the proposal of the NRC, the abrogation of Article 370 and the court decision on the Ram Temple have kept the country distracted from the downhill journey of the growth graph, that problem was certain to return to bite the ruling party, as became evident in the 2019 state polls in Maharashtra, Haryana and Jharkhand, where a nationalistic narrative backed by Modi's charisma and Shah's electoral management did not bring the expected outcome for the BJP.

That makes the Assembly polls in Delhi-scheduled to be held in February-all the more crucial for the BJP, especially so for Modi and Shah. Once again, the duo will face the direct challenge of a political opponent-Delhi chief minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal-in an electoral battle confined to a state. If the absence of a strong opponent at the national level has helped the two leaders script massive victories in successive Lok Sabha polls, their game plans have faltered in the past five years in several states-in Delhi and Bihar in 2015, in Punjab in 2017 and in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh in 2018. Any adverse outcome in the Assembly elections in Delhi and Bihar-scheduled to be held towards the end of 2020-will not only further shrink the BJP's political might but will also provide impetus to the combative alliances of opposition parties already buoyed by the success in Jharkhand and the partial success in Maharashtra and Haryana.

This also reinforces the fact that a strong, personality-driven party network or a united opposition has often successfully resisted the Modi-Shah juggernaut in the states. This should serve as a lesson to parties such as the SP, the BSP and the RJD, which have been fighting survival battles. All three parties have tasted success against the BJP-the SP and the BSP in by-polls in 2017 and the RJD in the 2015 Bihar polls. Yet, they have failed to build and consolidate a sustained narrative against the saffron party. Following victory in Jharkhand, the RJD sniffs an opportunity in Bihar, but the SP and the BSP have not yet shown the kind of belligerence that is expected of opposition parties despite Uttar Pradesh being in political turmoil following violent protests over the CAA.

In the past month, the state, most unexpectedly, has seen the Congress emerging as the loudest voice among opposition parties, hogging the maximum limelight. An aggressive Priyanka Gandhi-Congress general secretary in-charge of Uttar Pradesh-led from the front, at times indulging in theatrics, in consolidating party workers against the BJP. In fact, the main opposition party, the Congress, now ruling in seven states, up from three in 2017, appears more upbeat following the spontaneous outrage over CAA, though it has yet to resolve the leadership crisis at the top.

Following the Lok Sabha debacle, Rahul Gandhi resigned from the post of national president, with Sonia Gandhi taking charge of the party once again, as a temporary arrangement. The recent success of Maharashtra and Jharkhand appears to have pushed the conversation over electing a new full-time president to the backburner, with Rahul Gandhi continuing as the de-facto decision-maker, albeit without the responsibility. The party's strategy, backed by Rahul, in the coming state polls will be to forge alliances, wherever possible and even if it means playing second fiddle, with just one objective-prevent the BJP from grabbing the power. Seven states will go to the polls in the next two years-Delhi and Bihar in 2020 and Assam, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Kerala in 2021. In Kerala, the Congress leads the time-tested alliance of UDF. In Tamil Nadu, its alliance with the DMK is on a solid wicket, while in Bihar, a pre-poll tie-up with the RJD is a certainty. In Assam, the grand old party is toying with the idea of joining with the AIUDF to consolidate Muslim votes, while West Bengal may once again see a Congress-Left alliance.

In fact, most of the political narrative of 2020 is likely to be dominated by what happens in the election-bound states of the next two years. Assam has already been simmering with protest against the CAA, with momentum building for the birth of a regional political party. AGP, the original regional party of the state and now an ally of the BJP, voted in favour of the CAA and therefore has lost credibility among indigenous voters, who are vehemently against it. The Congress, sensing the public mood against the BJP and hoping for a consolidation of Muslim votes in a state with 35 per cent Muslim population, is gearing up for a strong fight against the saffron party in 2021. In that context, a regional party will be the best bet for the BJP, as it will siphon away the votes the BJP is likely to lose to the Congress. The BJP is unlikely to lose ground among non-Assamese speaking Hindus, tribals and tea garden workers, as these voters remain unaffected by the CAA.

The bigger battle for the BJP will, however, be in West Bengal where it will challenge chief minister Mamata Banerjee's TMC. The success in the Lok Sabha-the BJP won 18 of the state's 42 Lok Sabha seats, bringing down the TMC's tally to 22-has given hope for a lotus bloom in the state, considered the final frontier for the right-wing party. Political analysts believe that the West Bengal Assembly poll was the driving force behind the haste to pass the CAA and Shah's reiterations about NRC. The two issues are expected to consolidate Hindu votes for the BJP in the state. However, the derailment of the NRC and the resounding victories of the TMC in three Assembly by-polls in November indicate that events are not unfolding per the BJP's plans in Bengal. What troubles the party is also the fact that it doesn't have a credible face to counter the overwhelming personality of Mamata Banerjee.

In Bihar, cracks are visible in the alliance between the BJP and chief minister Nitish Kumar's JD(U). Nitish, known for his political somersaults, has publicly expressed opposition to NRC. Emboldened by what the Shiv Sena did to the BJP, it would not be a shocker if he were to ask for a bigger share of seats in the Assembly polls-or switch sides just before the polls. After all, in 2015, the JD(U) joined with the RJD and the Congress and decimated the BJP in the polls. Though the BJP-JD(U) alliance had a sweeping victory in the Lok Sabha polls in May 2019, going by the role reversal witnessed in neighbouring Jharkhand-where the BJP had an almost-clean sweep in the Lok Sabha polls-a Congress-RJD alliance in Bihar, which is almost a certainty, will likely offer a strong fight to the ruling coalition in the state.

The two southern states-Tamil Nadu and Kerala-will be the toughest battlegrounds for the BJP. The magic of Modi and Shah did not work in the two states even during the Lok Sabha polls. In the past year, Modi has made several political gestures to woo Tamil voters. In October 2019, he appeared in a veshti while hosting Chinese President Xi Jinping at an informal summit at Mamallapuram, a coastal town near Chennai. In the last Mann Ki Baat of 2019, he noted that the last day of Pongal would be celebrated as the birth anniversary of the great writer-philosopher-saint Tiruvalluvar. Yet, the BJP's electoral plan in the southern state remains vague-with ally AIADMK facing huge anti-incumbency and superstar Rajinikanth unwilling to officially join forces with Modi. In Kerala also, the party has not been able to cover much ground.

Away from these electoral battles, the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir will continue to attract national and global attention. The lockdown in the region may have enforced calm, but how the government chalks a path to real normalcy has the potential to determine the course of national politics over the next 12 months. The unrest in the rest of the country over the CAA and NRC will give the Modi government increasingly less margin for error in Kashmir. In fact, the mistimed CAA and the misplaced emphasis on the NRC have now complicated a hitherto innocuous exercise-the National Population Register-with the government likely to face resistance over the implementation of this project.

Despite mounting challenges, Modi and Shah are unlikely to be conciliatory. They have the bravado and political capital to spring surprises every now and then, surprises that often catch rivals off-guard and swing public mood in their favour-a fact even their political rivals concede. "The PM-HM duo seems to have an ill-intentioned plan to polarise the electorate permanently," says P. Chidambaram, Congress Rajya Sabha member and former Union finance and home minister. "After relative smooth sailing with earlier polarising measures (criminalisation of triple talaq, repeal of Art 370, the NRC exercise in Assam), they have run into a formidable obstacle that has seen through their game-the people, especially the young. Meanwhile, the economy is in the ICU, as pointed out by Arvind Subramanian. I expect fissures to show up in the BJP, I expect institutional resistance and I expect international backlash. How the PM-HM duo will respond to the new situation will determine the immediate future of the nation. I am very sceptical and have little faith in their 'goodness'."

The electorate will have the final word on the scepticism of the opposition, but what remains undisputed is the fact that Modi and Shah will continue to occupy the political centerstage of India in 2020.

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