Keep trying
Sir — Waiting for a reply to a job application can seem like an eternity. Recently, a 70-year-old woman was shocked to hear about a job she had applied for almost fifty years ago. Tizi Hodson dreamt of becoming a stunt rider and wrote a letter applying for a job in 1976. However, the letter was stuck behind a drawer in the post office for decades and never made it to the recruiters. Although Todson missed out on the said job, she went on to have a successful career nonetheless. Perhaps job aspirants can take heart from Hodson’s story and keep trying alternative venues for success even if they do not get their dream job.
Sutrishna Dalpati,
Howrah
Unexpected win
Sir — The Bharatiya Janata Party has snatched victory from the jaws of defeat in Haryana (“Haryana bout: BJP floors Cong”, Oct 10). The third consecutive win in the state assembly polls was unexpected even for the BJP itself. Building a good inner party network and replacing the chief minister — the greenhorn Nayab Singh Saini substituted the veteran Manohar Lal Khattar — months ahead of the polls helped the BJP beat anti-incumbency.
C.K. Subramaniam,
Navi Mumbai
Sir — Defying all exit poll projections and anti-incumbency, the Haryana assembly election results handed a historic victory to the Bharatiya Janata Party. The outcome raises significant concerns about the rationale behind the media’s practice of conducting exit polls. In the past, the results of crucial Lok Sabha elections have been markedly different from the media’s forecasts. The intricacies of poll dynamics seem to have intensified, making the endeavour to assess voter preferences a seemingly fruitless pursuit.
Exit polls induce only a temporary flutter by providing fuel to political debates and discussions. The Election Commission of India should prohibit such a meaningless and wasteful exercise.
Kamal Laddha,
Bengaluru
Sir — The BJP’s surprise win in Haryana is not enough for the party to recover from its setback in the Lok Sabha elections. Interestingly, making Nayab Singh Saini the face of the party’s poll campaign shifted the focus to local issues. Every election victory of the BJP so far has been claimed as a mandate for Narendra Modi. This is not true of Haryana. It remains to be seen whether the BJP uses this victory to its advantage in poll-bound Maharashtra and Jharkhand.
G. David Milton,
Maruthancode, Tamil Nadu
Sir — Contrary to pollsters’ predictions, the BJP has managed to retain power in Haryana by increasing its seats from 40 to 48 and vote share from 36.5% to 39.9%, securing a third consecutive term. The saffron party’s astute social engineering, gaining support from non-Jat castes by propping up leaders from among them, and its strengths in urban areas helped it sail through. This is a remarkable achievement for the BJP, which was saddled not just with anti-incumbency but also facing a resurgent Congress that was projected to win more seats. While the farmer and wrestler-led agitations helped the Congress do well in rural areas, it was not enough to break the BJP’s social coalition there or dent the latter’s urban strongholds.
Vipin Singh,
Faridabad
Sir — In Haryana, the Congress’s vote share actually increased by 11% compared to 2019 from 28% to 39%. The BJP’s vote share increased by little over 3% from 36.4% to 39.9%. With the Congress under Bhupinder Singh Hooda’s leadership being seen to aggressively play up the Jat factor, there was a creeping non-Jat consolidation in favour of the BJP on the ground. This was the silent factor, almost unnoticed in the din of electioneering. With an OBC face in Nayab Singh Saini as the chief minister, the BJP was the natural magnet for the OBC voter.
Hemant Singh,
Panchkula, Haryana
