Bharatiya Jana Sangh (1951–77)

Influential figures

Syama Prasad Mookerjee, founder of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh

Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the first BJP prime minister (1998–2004)

Lal Krishna Advani, deputy Prime Minister under Vajpayee and one of the architects of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement

The BJP’s origins lie in the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, popularly known as the Jana Sangh, founded by Syama Prasad Mukherjee in 1951 in response to the politics of the dominant Congress party. It was founded in collaboration with the Hindu nationalist volunteer organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), and was widely regarded as the political arm of the RSS.^[47] The Jana Sangh’s aims included the protection of India’s “Hindu” cultural identity, in addition to countering what it perceived to be the appeasement of Muslim people and the country of Pakistan by the Congress party and then-Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. The RSS loaned several of its leading pracharaks, or full-time workers, to the Jana Sangh to get the new party off the ground. Prominent among these was Deendayal Upadhyaya, who was appointed General Secretary. The Jana Sangh won only three Lok Sabha seats in the first general elections in 1952. It maintained a minor presence in parliament until 1967.^[48][49]

The Jana Sangh’s first major campaign, begun in early 1953, centred on a demand for the complete integration of Jammu and Kashmir into India.^[50] Mukherjee was arrested in May 1953 for violating orders from the state government restraining him from entering Kashmir. He died of a heart attack the following month, while still in jail.^[50] Mauli Chandra Sharma was elected to succeed Mukherjee; however, he was forced out of power by the RSS activists within the party, and the leadership went instead to Upadhyaya. Upadhyay remained the General Secretary until 1967, and worked to build a committed grassroots organisation in the image of the RSS. The party minimised engagement with the public, focusing instead on building its network of propagandists. Upadhyaya also articulated the philosophy of integral humanism, which formed the official doctrine of the party.^[51] Younger leaders, such as Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Lal Krishna Advani also became involved with the leadership in this period, with Vajpayee succeeding Upadhyaya as president in 1968. The major themes on the party’s agenda during this period were legislating a uniform civil code, banning cow slaughter and abolishing the special status given to Jammu and Kashmir.^[52]

After assembly elections across the country in 1967, the party entered into a coalition with several other parties, including the Swatantra Party and the socialists. It formed governments in various states across the Hindi heartland, including Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. It was the first time the Jana Sangh held political office, albeit within a coalition; this caused the shelving of the Jana Sangh’s more radical agenda.^[53]

Janata Party (1977–80)

In 1975, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi imposed a state of emergency. The Jana Sangh took part in the widespread protests, with thousands of its members being imprisoned along with other agitators across the country. In 1977, the emergency was withdrawn and general elections were held. The Jana Sangh merged with parties from across the political spectrum, including the Socialist Party, the Congress (O) and the Bharatiya Lok Dal to form the Janata Party, with its main agenda being defeating Indira Gandhi.^[49] The Janata Party won a majority in 1977 and formed a government with Morarji Desai as Prime Minister. The former Jana Sangh contributed the largest tally to the Janata Party’s parliamentary contingent, with 93 seats or 31% of its strength. Vajpayee, previously the leader of the Jana Sangh, was appointed the Minister of External Affairs.^[54]

The national leadership of the former Jana Sangh consciously renounced its identity, and attempted to integrate with the political culture of the Janata Party, based on Gandhian and Hindu traditionalist principles. Political scientist Christophe Jaffrelot wrote that this proved to be impossible assimilation.^[55] The state and local levels of the Jana Sangh remained relatively unchanged, retaining a strong association with the RSS, which did not sit well with the moderate centre-right constituents of the Party.^[56] Violence between Hindus and Muslims increased sharply during the years that the Janata Party formed the government, with former Jana Sangha members being implicated in the riots in Aligarh and Jamshedpur in 1978–79. The other major constituents of the Janata Party demanded that the Jana Sangh should break from the RSS, which the Jana Sangh refused to do. Eventually, a fragment of the Janata Party broke off to form the Janata Party (Secular). The Morarji Desai government was reduced to a minority in the Parliament, forcing its resignation. Following a brief period of coalition rule, general elections were held in 1980, in which the Janata Party fared poorly, winning only 31 seats. In April 1980, shortly after the elections, the National Executive Council of the Janata Party banned its members from being ‘dual members’ of party and the RSS. In response, the former Jana Sangh members left to create a new political party, known as the Bharatiya Janata Party.^[57][54]

BJP (1980–present)

Formation and early days

Although the newly formed BJP was technically distinct from the Jana Sangh, the bulk of its rank and file were identical to its predecessor, with Vajpayee being its first president.^[58] Historian Ramachandra Guha writes that the early 1980s were marked by a wave of violence between Hindus and Muslims. The BJP initially moderated the Hindu nationalist stance of its predecessor the Jana Sangh to gain a wider appeal, emphasising its links to the Janata Party and the ideology of Gandhian Socialism.^[59] This was unsuccessful, as it won only two Lok Sabha seats in the elections of 1984.^[59] The assassination of Indira Gandhi a few months earlier resulted in a wave of support for the Congress which won a record tally of 403 seats, contributing to the low number for the BJP.^[60]

Ram Janmabhoomi movement

The failure of Vajpayee’s moderate strategy led to a shift in the ideology of the party toward a policy of more hardline Hindu nationalism.^[59][61] In 1984, Advani was appointed president of the party, and under him it became the political voice of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement. In the early 1980s, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) began a campaign for the construction of a temple dedicated to the Hindu deity Rama at the disputed site of the Babri Mosque in Ayodhya. The mosque had been constructed by the Mughal Emperor Babur in 1527. There is a dispute about whether a temple once stood there.^[62] The agitation was on the basis of the belief that the site is the birthplace of Rama, and that a temple had been demolished to construct the mosque.^[63] The BJP threw its support behind this campaign and made it a part of their election platform. It won 86 Lok Sabha seats in 1989, a tally which made its support crucial to the National Front government of V. P. Singh.^[64]

In September 1990, Advani began a rath yatra (chariot journey) to Ayodhya in support of the Ram temple movement. According to Guha, the imagery employed by the yatra was “religious, allusive, militant, masculine, and anti-Muslim”.^[65] Advani was placed under preventive detention on the orders of the then Bihar chief minister Lalu Prasad Yadav. A large number of kar sevaks (religious volunteers) nonetheless converged at Ayodhya, and some attacked the mosque. Three days of fighting with the paramilitary forces ended with the deaths of several kar sevaks. Hindus were urged by VHP to “take revenge” for these deaths, resulting in riots against Muslims across Uttar Pradesh. ^[66] The BJP withdrew its support from the V.P. Singh government, leading to fresh general elections. The BJP further increased its tally to 120 seats, and won a majority in the Uttar Pradesh assembly.^[67]

On 6 December 1992, the RSS and its affiliates organised a rally involving more than 100,000 VHP and BJP activists at the site of the mosque.^[67] The rally developed into a frenzied attack that ended with the demolition of the mosque.^[67] Over the following weeks, waves of violence between Hindus and Muslims erupted all over the country, killing over 2,000 people.^[67] The government briefly banned the VHP, and many BJP leaders, including Advani were arrested for making inflammatory speeches provoking the demolition.^[68][69] Several historians have said that the demolition was the product of a conspiracy by the Sangh Parivar, and not a spontaneous act.^[67] In the parliamentary elections in 1996, the BJP capitalised on the communal polarisation that followed the demolition to win 161 Lok Sabha seats, making it the largest party in parliament.^[42] Vajpayee was sworn in as Prime Minister but was unable to attain a majority in the Lok Sabha, forcing the government to resign after 13 days.^[42]

A 2009 report, authored by Justice Manmohan Singh Liberhan, found that 68 people were responsible for the demolition, mostly leaders from the BJP.^[69] Among those named were Vajpayee, Advani, and Murli Manohar Joshi. The report also criticised Kalyan Singh, Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh during the demolition.^[69] He was accused of posting bureaucrats and police officers who would stay silent during the demolition.^[69] In 2020, the Supreme Court of India acquitted all of the accused in the demolition including Advani and Joshi.^[70]

Vajpayee era (1998, 1999–2004)

A coalition of regional parties formed the government in 1996, but this grouping was short-lived, and mid-term polls were held in 1998. The BJP contested the elections leading a coalition called the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which contained its existing allies like the Samata Party, the Shiromani Akali Dal, the Shiv Sena in addition to the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and the Biju Janata Dal. Among these regional parties, the Shiv Sena was the only one that had an ideology similar to the BJP; Amartya Sen, for example, called the coalition an “ad hoc” grouping.^[71] The NDA had a majority with outside support from the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and Vajpayee returned as Prime Minister.^[72] However, the coalition ruptured in May 1999 when the leader of AIADMK, J. Jayalalitha, withdrew her support, and fresh elections were held again.^[73]

On 13 October 1999, without the AIADMK, the NDA won 303 seats in parliament and thus an outright majority. The BJP had its highest-ever tally of 183. Vajpayee became Prime Minister for the third time; Advani became Deputy Prime Minister^[a] and Home Minister. This NDA government lasted its full term of five years. Its policy agenda included a more aggressive stance on defence and terror and neo-liberal economic policies.^[43] In 2001, Bangaru Laxman, then the BJP president, was filmed accepting a bribe in a sting operation.^[74][75] He was compelled to resign and was subsequently prosecuted, eventually being sentenced to four years in prison.^[76]

2002 Gujarat violence

On 27 February 2002, a train carrying Hindu pilgrims was burned outside the town of Godhra, killing 59 people. The incident was seen as an attack upon Hindus, and sparked off massive anti-Muslim violence across the state of Gujarat that lasted several weeks.^[77] The death toll estimated was as high as 2000, while 150,000 were displaced.^[78] Rape, mutilation, and torture were also widespread.^[78][79] The then-Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and several high-ranking government officials were accused of initiating and condoning the violence, as were police officers who allegedly directed the rioters and gave them lists of Muslim-owned properties.^[80] In April 2009, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) was appointed by the Supreme Court to investigate and expedite the Gujarat riots cases. In 2012, Modi was cleared of complicity in the violence by the SIT. BJP MLA Maya Kodnani, who later held a cabinet portfolio in the Modi government, was convicted of having orchestrated one of the riots and sentenced to 28 years imprisonment;^[81][82] she was later acquitted by the Gujarat High Court.^[83] Scholars such as Paul Brass, Martha Nussbaum and Dipankar Gupta have said that there was a high level of state complicity in the incidents.^[84][85][86]

In opposition (2004–2014)

Vajpayee called for early elections in 2004, six months ahead of schedule. The NDA’s campaign was based on the slogan “India Shining”, which sought to depict it as responsible for a rapid economic transformation of the country.^[87] However, the NDA unexpectedly suffered a heavy defeat, winning only 186 seats in the Lok Sabha, compared to the 222 of the Congress and its allies. Manmohan Singh succeeded Vajpayee as Prime Minister as the head of the United Progressive Alliance. The NDA’s failure to reach out to rural Indians was provided as an explanation for its defeat, as was its divisive policy agenda.^[87][88]

In May 2008, the BJP won the state elections in Karnataka. This was the first time that the party won assembly elections in any South Indian state. In the 2009 general elections, its strength in the Lok Sabha was reduced to 116 seats. It lost the Karnataka assembly election in 2013.^[89]

Modi era (2014–present)

Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India since 2014

Amit Shah has been the longest (continuous) serving National President of the BJP

In the 2014 Indian general election, the BJP won 282 seats, leading the NDA to a tally of 336 seats in the 543-seat Lok Sabha.^[90] Narendra Modi was sworn in as the 14th Prime Minister of India on 26 May 2014.^[91][92] The vote share of the BJP was 31% of all votes cast, a low figure relative to the number of seats it won.^[93] This was the first instance since 1984 of a single party achieving an outright majority in the Indian Parliament^[94] and the first time that it achieved a majority in the Lok Sabha on its own strength. Support was concentrated in the Hindi-speaking belt in North-central India.^[93] The magnitude of the victory was not predicted by most opinion and exit polls.^[93]

Political analysts have suggested several reasons for this victory, including the popularity of Modi, and the loss of support for the Congress due to the corruption scandals in its previous term.^[95] The BJP was also able to expand its traditionally upper-caste, upper-class support base and received significant support from middle-class and Dalit people, as well as among Other Backward Classes.^[96][93] Its support among Muslims remained low; only 8% of Muslim voters voted for the BJP.^[96][93] The BJP was also very successful at mobilizing its supporters and raising voter turnout among them.^[93]

After winning the election, the organisation of the BJP became more centralised with Modi at the helm.^[97] People loyal to Modi were rewarded leadership positions across various states within India.^[98] Amit Shah, a close confidant of Modi, was appointed as the president of the BJP in 2014.^[99] Contextually, many veteran leaders of the party like Lal Krishna Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, and Jaswant Singh amongst others were allegedly sidelined.^[100]

In 2016, the BJP joined the International Democratic Union, a grouping of various centre-right and right-wing political parties across the globe.^[101] However, in 2024, the party was removed from the membership of the grouping.^[102]

From 2014 onward, BJP witnessed drastic growth in plenty of states. The part won for the first time in the state legislative election of Assam in 2016. Apart from this, one of the most significant gains for the party was in Uttar Pradesh, the largest state in India by population. The BJP won the legislative assembly elections in 2017 with a landslide margin. Likewise, the party also made significant inroads in other North-eastern states.^[103]

In 2019, the BJP won the general election with a renewed majority. Soon after returning to power, on 5 August 2019, the Modi administration revoked the special status, or limited autonomy, granted under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution to Jammu and Kashmir—a region administered by India as a state. This state consists of the larger part of Kashmir which has been the subject of a dispute among India, Pakistan, and China since 1947.^[104][105]

Later in 2019, the Modi administration introduced the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019, which was passed by the Parliament of India on 11 December 2019. It amended the Citizenship Act, 1955 by providing a path to Indian citizenship for illegal immigrants of Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, or Christian religion, who had fled persecution from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan before December 2014.^[106][107] Muslims from those countries were not given such eligibility.^[108] The act was the first time religion had been overtly used as a criterion for citizenship under Indian law.^{[108][b][c][d]} A report by the V-Dem Institute described India as experiencing democratic backsliding due to the Modi era,^[45][46] which is considered the most notable challenge to India’s democracy since the authoritarian Emergency years of 1975–77.^[109][110]