NEW DELHI: In what may be a watershed in Indian politics, BJP would for the first time be contesting more seats than Congress in the Lok Sabha elections.

The reversal of roles as the senior party comes after BJP in 2014 shot to a historic high in the LS tally while Congress slumped to an unprecedented low with mere 44 seats.

While for BJP, its highest list of candidates is a sign of its national growth, for Congress, its low tally is sign of pragmatism resulting in wide alliance-making.

This year, BJP has announced 437 candidates in LS polls. In contrast, Congress has named 423 only while there are a couple of more seats to be announced in Uttar Pradesh. It is unlikely that Congress tally can now surpass that of its arch rival.

To observers, these figures are historic since Congress was always a national party, its roots going back to pre-Independence, while BJP, mutating from its forerunner Bharatiya Jana Sangh, was for a long time with minimal national footprint.

Though BJP also came to power at the Centre in 1998 and 1999 under Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the 2014 contest marked an inflection point when Modi propelled it to a majority of its own with 282 seats. In contrast, Congress plummeted to 44 MPs.

It marked the point when BJP became a truly national party with pan-India presence while Congress came face to face with an existential crisis.

However, Congress contesting fewer seats than BJP is reflective of the grand old party learning from its crisis and stitching wide alliances to make up for its lost political muscle.

Says Praveen Chakravarty, who heads the AICC’s data analytics department, “BJP contesting more seats than Congress shows how contrary to perception, Congress has been far more successful in striking new alliances this time and the BJP has lost alliance partners since 2014.”

However, BJP spokesman GVL Narsimha Rao said BJP is many times bigger than Congress in terms of membership, electoral base and states under its rule. He said Congress was still contesting a disproportionately higher number of seats than its political strength which was reflective of its failure to stitch good alliances.

Congress’ Chakravarty argued that there is an inverse relationship between the number of seats national parties contest and their strike rate in elections. “BJP contested its least number of seats, 339, in 1999 elections and it won

182. Congress contested its highest tally since 1996, in 2014, and what was the result (44 MPs),” he said.

In 2014, BJP contested 428 seats to Congress’ 464; in 2009, BJP contested 433 to 440; in 2004, BJP contested 364 to Congress’ 414.

