Old faces who may have “lost acceptance” and the failure of issues such as alleged infiltration to gain traction among Adivasis appear to have let down the BJP’s attempt to recapture power in Jharkhand on Saturday.

The trends as of 2 pm showed the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM)-led INDIA bloc heading towards a comfortable majority in the 81-member Assembly. The JMM led in 33 constituencies while the Congress was ahead in 16, with the BJP leading in 22 constituencies, as of 2.30 pm. INDIA allies Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and CPI(ML)(L) won five and two seats respectively.

According to BJP leaders, the Hemant Soren government’s Maiyya Samman Yojana that provides Rs 1,000 to underprivileged women clicked in favour of the ruling alliance and a significant turnout of women voters indicated that. In the first phase, in which 43 seats went to polls, 69% of women turned out to vote.

A senior Jharkhand BJP leader said a detailed review of the party’s defeat would be conducted but prima facie it appeared that its tribal faces failed to draw the votes of the community. “The party is still presenting old faces such as Babu Lal Marandi and Arjun Munda who have lost acceptance among the masses. It appears that the public wants a change in leadership,” said the leader, questioning why Marandi, who is the state unit president, contested from a general seat, Dhanwar, instead of a tribal constituency. “If he was so popular among tribals, why did he choose to contest from a general category seat? He is leading too. Had it been better if he would have contested from an ST-reserved seat to message among tribal voters?”

Marandi is the state’s first CM and Munda, who lost the election from from Khunti earlier this year, is also a former CM. The BJP fielded Munda’s wife Meera from Potka (ST-reserved), where she is in a close contest against the JMM’s Sanjib Sardar. After 12 of 21 rounds of counting, she was trailing by 1,149 votes. To bolster its Adivasi leadership, the BJP also inducted former CM Champai Soren from the JMM and Hemant Soren’s sister-in-law Sita Soren. While Champai was leading from Seraikella by more than 35,000 votes after nine rounds of counting and six more to go, Sita Soren was trailing Congress’s Irfan Ansari by more than 40,000 votes after 10 rounds of counting and nine more to go. “The party should now develop new leaders from the tribal community in Jharkhand,” said a BJP leader.

Another BJP leader said its campaign to unite tribals and non-tribals as “Hindus” with slogans of “batenge toh katenge (divided we fall)”, “ek hain to safe hain (together we are safe)”, “ghuspaitiye (infiltrators)”, “love jihad”, and land jihad failed to enthuse tribal voters. The BJP narrative around alleged infiltration in Adivasi areas and shrinking tribal population was shaped by Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, who was the Jharkhand election co-in-charge of the party.

“These slogans were to get votes of tribal voters in Santhal Pargana where Muslims are in a large number and they play a decisive role in elections. The trends show that tribal and OBC voters of Jharkhand are not concerned about these issues. Tribal are concerned more about their identity and OBCs are developing a progressive mindset. Notably, no tribal leader of the BJP or any other party too raised the issue of infiltration and love jihad in the past elections. That indicates that these issues mean nothing for Jharkhand people,” said a BJP leader.

The arrest of JMM leader and Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren in an alleged money laundering case may have also backfired for the BJP as Soren and his party projected it as the BJP’s attempt to go after an Adivasi CM, a son of the soil. Of the 28 ST-reserved seats in the state, BJP won only two in the 2019 Assembly polls and this time it was leading in five as of 2.30 pm.