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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 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.
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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]
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On 2 February 2024, during the Motion of Thanks on the President's address, I.N.D.I.A. bloc's leader Mallikarjun Kharge made certain remarks on BJP's 400 paar (crossing 400 seats) claim.[22] Taking a jibe at the claim, he said:
"Aapka itna bahumat hai, pehle 330, 334 thi, ab toh '400 paar' ho raha hai" (lit.'You have a majority of 330, 334 seats and 400 is being crossed now')
Prime minister Modi considered it as an endorsement of the “abki baar 400 paar" slogan.[23]
Kharge later raised the issue, stating two pages from his speech were removed, distorting the intent of their speech. Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar after listening to the recording of the speech gave his ruling to the issue, stating Kharge had plenty of time to revisit his words during his speech.[24]
Members of the opposition have criticized the slogan for being “about absolute power”.[25]
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Experts had debated over whether, realistically, the BJP could win 400 seats.[26]
In the 2024 elections, the BJP lost its singular majority and the NDA won 293 seats, with the BJP securing only 240 seats.[21] Also Indian National Congress led I.N.D.I.A bloc to secure 237 seats.
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