Battle For 2019- Modi's Enemy, My Friend

If there is an aggregation of grievances on controversial issues like demonetisation, job generation, performance of government banks, social tensions and mob violence, then a united opposition can humble Narendra Modi.

- Sachidananda Murthy

A laptop and a comb— Jairam Ramesh used to joke that these were the only accessories he and Salman Khurshid had in the Congress war room when they took on the might of prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s campaign machinery in 2004. With the catchy slogan “aam aadmi ko kya mila [what did the common man get]”, Sonia Gandhi’s struggling Congress outwitted the BJP by a slight margin. The laptop was for storing data on swing constituencies and the comb was to get ready to face curious television cameras.

But, 14 years later, the campaign machinery of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah is bigger, more aggressive and proactive than what Pramod Mahajan had assembled for Vajpayee. There are thousands of computers and programmers in war rooms spread across the country to crunch data, domestic and foreign consultants for inputs on surprise strategies and stormtroopers to poach influential opposition leaders (the latest catch is the working president of the Gujarat Congress).