(This is the ninth in a series of insightful reports from the ground, titled The Race From India to Bharat. The author travels all across India as 960 million voters get ready to celebrate the largest festival of democracy in the world: the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. What do ordinary Indians think and feel about the past, present, and future of India? Are they convinced that the old fault lines are healing?)
(Read part one here, part two here, part three here, part four here, part five here, part six here, part seven here, and part eight here.)
The author drove back from Shimla just as voting inside the assembly was about to take place to elect a Rajya Sabha MP from Himachal Pradesh. Quite a few people the author met in the state between 25 and 27 February had dropped hints that the Congress party was about to be hit by a bombshell.
Since my journey of three months across the country is one about the mindsets and attitudes of ordinary citizens as India transitions to Bharat, I did not pay much attention to local political developments. Besides, the Rajya Sabha election looked like a cakewalk for the Congress.
In an assembly of 68, it had 40 MLAs with three more independent MLAs supporting it. What could the BJP with just 25 MLAs do?