New Delhi,
Prime Minister Narendra Modi today termed the electoral results from North-East an endorsement of “positive and development oriented agenda of the NDA” and “strength” of the organisation.

The results have turned the BJP into a truly pan-India party, pointed BJP chief Amit Shah at a press conference. A beaming Shah also termed the victories in Left-citadel Tripura and Nagaland an endorsement of Prime Minister Modi’s leadership by the people of the Northeast.

However Shah, who along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made the BJP into election-winning machinery, said the party’s “golden time” will come when they oust Opposition parties to form governments in Kerala, West Bengal and Odisha.

Addressing party workers later in the day, Modi said Congress was never as diminished as it is now; there are leaders whose designation rises while their stature shrinks.

Today’s results come as a boost for the saffron party pulled down by recent losses in Lok Sabha and Assembly byelections in Punjab, Rajasthan, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh.

Though the number of Lok Sabha seats they hold are not big (Tripura has just two Lok Sabha seats), but the results have given the BJP a reason to cheer, of making gains at new places.

Today’s electoral results are important for the saffron party in more than one ways.

The first direct contest between the Left and the BJP has helped the saffron party discard its distinctively “Hindu” hues. Alongside they also raised the hopes of making electoral gains from hitherto uncharted territories, especially the only Left stronghold in the country (Kerala), in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

Facing flak over job loss and farmers’ unrest, ground-reports from parts of Hindi heartland are not so encouraging for the BJP. However with these results the party, which has managed to excel the art of “customised politics” with the help of a well-crafted poll campaign and charisma of national leadership, has managed to send positive perceptions in places beyond North-East.