Votes but no seats: In Punjab, why BJP continues to be in the doldrums

However, SAD spokesperson Arshdeep Kaler sounded upbeat about the Sukhbir Badal-led party’s performance. “We have managed to double our vote share as compared to last year’s Lok Sabha polls, a feat which neither the BJP nor Congress has achieved in the seat. The ruling party (AAP) has an upper hand in the bypoll but it does not mean the 2027 Assembly election results will be the same,” he told The Indian Express.

Even as Punjab BJP president Sunil Jakhar hailed the bypoll result, claiming it “showed the mirror to the AAP” and that it was indicative of the people “looking beyond the ruling AAP and the Congress”, BJP insiders admitted that merely getting a significant vote share was not enough, echoing the point they made after the party virtually doubled its vote share to 18.5% in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls without winning any seat.

“The message from the bypoll is loud and clear. The Punjab BJP needs introspection, strategic clarity and a structural overhaul. Finishing second or third or just saving deposits will not work anymore. It is time to begin groundwork and candidate selection for the 2027 Assembly polls,” a party source said.

In the Ludhiana West bypoll, the BJP finished third, ahead of the SAD, with a 22.5% vote share. The AAP won the seat while the Congress finished runner-up.

The BJP had pulled out all stops in the run-up to the bypoll and roped in party heavyweights, including Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta, Haryana CM Nayab Singh Saini, Union Ministers Hardeep Singh Puri and Ravneet Bittu, into the campaign.

However, the BJP still saw its vote share marginally dip in the seat as compared to the 2022 Assembly polls, when it had contested in alliance with the then Captain Amarinder Singh-led outfit Punjab Lok Congress (PLC) and SAD (Sanyukt) and secured 24.2% of the votes despite facing pushback over the now-repealed farm laws. The PLC has since merged with the BJP while the SAD (Sanyukt) has been dissolved.

The BJP had led in the Ludhiana West Assembly segment in the last year’s Lok Sabha polls, and was said to be growing in the seat which was once seen as a stronghold of its erstwhile ally SAD.

Some BJP insiders however dismissed the relevance of the Lok Sabha voting patterns to gauge the Assembly poll results. “If that was true, the Congress would not have lost the Jalandhar West seat in last year’s bypoll by over 35,000 votes barely a month after winning the Lok Sabha seat by over 1.75 lakh votes there,” a senior BJP leader said.

Recurring pattern

In the June 2022 Sangrur Lok Sabha bypoll, which was won by the SAD (Amritsar), the BJP finished fourth, ahead of the SAD. In the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP saw its vote share in Jalandhar rise to 21.64% – from 15.18% in the 2023 bypoll held in the seat – but finished runner-up.

In the July 2024 Jalandhar West bypoll, necessitated by the defection of sitting AAP MLA Sheetal Angural to the BJP, the party stood second ahead of the SAD with a 18.94% vote share, a dip from the 28.81% it received in the 2022 polls where it finished third.

In the four Assembly bypolls – Gidderbaha, Chabbewal, Dera Baba Nanak and Barnala – held in November last year, where the SAD was out of the fray due to its president Sukhbir Singh Badal facing religious punishment by the Akal Takht, the BJP finished third in all the seats while managing to save its deposit only in Barnala.

Fielding prominent faces did not help the BJP’s cause. In Gidderbaha, former minister Manpreet Singh Badal polled just over 12,000 votes while Ravi Karan Kahlon, the son of former Speaker Nirmal Singh Kahlon, got just over 6,000 votes in Dera Baba Nanak. Four-time MLA Sohan Singh Thandal, who had defected from the SAD to the BJP just ahead of the bypolls, managed to secure only 8,692 votes in Chabbewal. Thandal has now returned to the SAD.

Even as the BJP aims to make its presence felt in the 2027 Assembly polls, it seems to be gripped by uncertainty. After failing to win even a single seat in the Lok Sabha polls, Jakhar had offered to resign as the state BJP chief, but the party central leadership has yet to take a decision on it, leaving the revamp of the state unit pending.