Even among opponents, it was widely believed that though the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would remain India’s single largest party, even perhaps by a large margin, after the country’s elections, it would definitely fall short of a majority. Few would have dared to predict the eventual outcome. Topping its single majority tally of 282 out of 543 Lok Sabha seats in 2014, the BJP has now breached the three hundred mark while its vote share has jumped from 31 percent to 38.

The reasons for that earlier prediction seemed well founded. In the three previous general elections the single most important factor determining election outcomes was the state of the economy. In 2004 its failures brought down the BJP-led coalition government; in 2009 better performance returned the coalition government led by the Indian National Congress (INC) to power; and in 2014 its deficiencies, allied with Modi’s central campaign slogan of “development for all,” secured for the first time after thirty years, a single party majority for the winning party — this time the BJP which, with pre-poll allies gathered under the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), has formed the government.

This time the economic situation was a mess. Widespread agrarian distress provoked major farmer mobilizations, joblessness (particularly for younger newer entrants into the job market) reached new peaks, and accelerating inequalities of income and wealth created stronger comparative dissatisfactions. And in the Hindi heartland region of North and Central India where the BJP has been most strongly entrenched, in the late 2018 provincial assembly elections held in the three such states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Chattisgarh, BJP administrations were replaced by Congress governments. Surely this was a sign of a shift away from the BJP to the Congress and other regional formations?