Abki Baar 400 Paar

Modi addressing an election rally in Hazaribagh, Jharkhand (2014)
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Abki Baar 400 Paar (Hindi: अबकी बार, 400 पार, lit. 'This time surpassing 400') was a Hindi slogan used by the then Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and his party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2024 general election. The slogan sought to publicise the target by the ruling alliance, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), to win more than 400 of the 543 Lok Sabha seats in the 2024 general election.[1][2][3] The BJP set the target for itself to win more than 370 seats.[4] The only time a party or coalition had won more than 400 seats in Lok Sabha was the Indian National Congress (Indira) party led by Rajiv Gandhi in the 1984 general elections.

The BJP has used the slogan Abki Baar 300 Paar ('This time surpassing 300') in 2019 general election. In that elections, BJP was able to increase its tally from 282 to 303. The last time a party had won more than 300 seats was the Indian National Congress (Indira) led by Indira Gandhi in the 1980 general elections following the collapse of the Janata Party government. The slogan now served as both a rallying cry and a representation of the party's political goals for its adherents.[5]

The national leadership of the party, including the then Prime Minister Modi, party president J P Nadda, and Home Minister Amit Shah, have actively used the slogan while campaigning at political rallies.[6][7][8]

Election analysts have said that the path for the BJP to achieve this goal would likely be by winning more seats in South & East India than in previous elections. At the same time, the BJP would also have to retain its dominant performance in North and West India.[9]

Many political analysts agree that BJP had raised this slogan in order to achieve the two-third supermajority in the Lok Sabha required to implement sweeping amendments to the Constitution on its own, without any restrictions from its allies or opposition parties, notably implementing simultaneous polls & nationwide abolition of personal laws of non-Hindus.[10][11] Union Minister Ananthkumar Hegde, claimed that the BJP would utilise this supermajority to remove provisions of secularism and replace socialism & Gandhian philosophy with Hindutva as the official ideology of the nation. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma had claimed that it will be utilised to recover Hindu holy sites desecrated by Muslims like Gyanvapi mosque and Krishna Janmasthan and to annex Pakistan-administered Kashmir.[10][12] Some other BJP leaders have also stated that they will utilise this supermajority to remove low-caste Muslims from the ambit of reservation[13][14] alongside tribal converts to Christianity.[15][16][17] Another speculation involved the potential intentions of Modi to change the name of the country from the English India to the Sanskrit Bharat[18] following the government officially referring the incumbent President Draupadi Murmu as 'President of Bharat' in its official invitation card for the 2023 G20 New Delhi summit.[19][20]

The results of the election, declared on 4 June 2024, showed that the BJP could secure only 240 seats, 32 seats short of the majority.[21] This led to the return of coalition politics in India after 10 years.[21]

  1. ^ Malpani, Mehul (2024-02-29). "'Abki Baar, 400 Paar' slogan coined by public, not BJP: PM". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 2024-03-22.
  2. ^ "'Teesri baar Modi sarkar, abki baar 400 paar': BJP's slogan for 2024 Lok Sabha polls". India Today. 2 January 2024. Retrieved 2024-03-22.
  3. ^ Livemint (2024-01-02). "BJP coins new slogan for 2024 Lok Sabha polls—'…Ab ki baar 400 paar'". mint. Retrieved 2024-03-22.
  4. ^ Bharatvarsh, TV9 (2024-02-05). "तीसरी बार BJP 370 पार, और NDA 400 के पारः लोकसभा में बोले प्रधानमंत्री मोदी". TV9 Bharatvarsh (in Hindi). Retrieved 2024-06-08.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  5. ^ ""Teesri baar Modi Sarkar, ab ki baar 400 paar": BJP's new slogan for Lok Sabha 2024 polls". The Economic Times. ANI. 2024-01-02. ISSN 0013-0389. Retrieved 2024-03-22.
  6. ^ ""Modi Ko Chunte Hai" : BJP Launches Campaign For 2024 Lok Sabha Polls". NDTV.com. ANI. 25 January 2024. Retrieved 2024-03-22.
  7. ^ Singh, Akhilesh Kumar (2024-01-25). "'Sapne Nahi, Haqeeqat Bunte Hai'... : BJP launches campaign for 2024 Lok Sabha polls". The Times of India. ISSN 0971-8257. Retrieved 2024-03-22.
  8. ^ Bhavsar, Karishma Pranav (2024-03-09). "Top events of the day: PM Modi to visit 4 states, NEET UG registration last day". mint. Retrieved 2024-03-22.
  9. ^ "Will Modi win 400 seats in India's election? The south holds the answer". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 2024-04-18.
  10. ^ a b "Why NDA needs 400 seats? Here's what BJP leaders are saying". India Today. 2024-05-15. Retrieved 2024-06-01.
  11. ^ PTI (2024-05-26). "Uniform Civil Code, 'One Nation, One Election' to be implemented in next term, says Amit Shah". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 2024-06-14.
  12. ^ "400 paar: BJP's list of claims on what it will do with such a number". The Indian Express. 2024-05-15. Retrieved 2024-06-01.
  13. ^ "BJP against Muslim reservation to protect SC, ST, OBC quota, says UP Chief Minsiter Yogi Adityanath". The Economic Times. 2024-05-27. ISSN 0013-0389. Retrieved 2024-06-16.
  14. ^ "'If BJP wins, we will scrap Muslim reservation and give it to SC, ST, and OBC,' says Amit Shah in Telangana". The Times of India. 2024-05-09. ISSN 0971-8257. Retrieved 2024-06-16.
  15. ^ Poddar, Umang (2022-10-28). "Why the idea of reservations for Dalit Muslims and Christians has divided Ambedkarites". Scroll.in. Retrieved 2024-06-23.
  16. ^ "Slowly and steadily, RSS groups prepare ground for 'delisting' of converted tribals". The Indian Express. 2023-12-28. Retrieved 2024-06-23.
  17. ^ Anwar, Tarique (2024-03-05). "Lok Sabha Elections 2024: How Delisting is Polarising Tribals; Will it Impact Upcoming Polls?". The Mooknayak English - Voice Of The Voiceless. Retrieved 2024-06-23.
  18. ^ "India's elections: Modi and the BJP target two-thirds majority". IISS. Retrieved 2024-06-30.
  19. ^ "india vs bharat: India vs Bharat: A look at 2023's political controversy that stirred the dynamics of a nation's name - The Economic Times". m.economictimes.com. Retrieved 2024-06-30.
  20. ^ "India or Bharat: What's behind the dispute over the country's name?". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 2024-06-30.
  21. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference :1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).