That is why it is time to ask a big question that the BJP must confront sooner or later in the context of UP: is the verdict just an electoral setback that big players must get used to in the electoral cycles in our country? Or is this something more enduring? To put it bluntly: is the BJP facing the possibility of a terminal decline in UP?

It is a question worth asking, for parties run the risk of slipping into terminal decline when they miss their ‘turn’ in the incumbency cycle, when they perform badly in an election that was supposed to herald their revival and when the electoral ground begins to change. This is exactly what has happened to the BJP.

This election provides evidence that the BJP may be losing two key elements responsible for its rise to power. The Ramjanmabhoomi movement provided the BJP with an issue that created fresh political polarisation and yielded new following. That issue is no longer salient in UP.

When asked to pick one issue that mattered most to them while voting, only 1.1 per cent mentioned the Ramjanmabhoomi dispute. Clearly, pushing this issue that has no purchase further could only be suicidal for the party. As expected, the BJP was the party most preferred by those who mentioned this issue, but it did not figure anywhere close to the top for those who mentioned any other issue like price rise, unemployment, development, agrarian crisis, corruption and law and order. The party’s own issue has no salience; the party figures nowhere in issues that have salience.

... contd.