New Delhi

Lok Sabha Elections 2024: The 'Modi Ka Parivar' (Modi's family) campaign launched by PM Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party in response to Bihar politician and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) patriarch Lalu Prasad Yadav's 'Modi has no family' remark has emerged as political high-point of the ongoing election campaign.

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The hashtag 'Modi Ka Parivar' is topping the trend charts after the BJP supporters including PM Modi's cabinet colleagues added 'Modi Ka Parivar' to their social media bios. The coordinated move by the BJP coincided with PM Modi's comment during a public address in Telangana's Adilabad where he said that India's 1.4 billion people are his family. 

In PM Modi's parliamentary constituency in Varanasi in northern India, visuals showing the locals putting 'Hum Hain Modi Ka Parivar' (We are Modi's family) posters outside their homes have started pouring in. The campaign is gradually emerging as a defining moment ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.

Also read | BJP launches ‘Modi Ka Parivar’ campaign to counter Lalu Yadav’s ‘he has no family’ jibe

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But this is not a one-off case when the BJP has turned a verbal offensive against Modi to the party's advantage.

Also watch | India: PM Modi responds to RJD's Lalu Yadav's family jibe says "140 crore people my family"

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At least four times — between 2007 and 2024 — the BJP has weaponised verbal offensives against Modi to craft election campaigns in his favour that handed the party significant wins in different elections and eventually bolstered Modi's political profile.

Sonia Gandhi to Manishankar Aiyar: How Modi reversed political attacks

In 2007, Sonia Gandhi, Congress leader and the president of the ruling United Progressive Alliance, referred to Modi as 'Maut Ka Saudagar' (Merchant of Death) in relation to the 2002 Gujarat riots. 

The Gujarat BJP under Modi turned it around against the Congress as a party, that it claimed was shielding the perpetrators of the Parliament attack of 2001. 

The BJP won with a majority in Modi's home state, and bagged 117 of the 182 seats in the Gujarat Assembly.

As Sonia Gandhi-led UPA sought a third term in power in 2014, the BJP put out Modi as its prime ministerial candidate. In one of the key moments of the election campaign, senior Congress leader Manishankar Aiyar snidely remarked that Modi would never become India's prime minister. "He could sell tea at a Congress conclave instead," Aiyar said, in a purported reference to Modi's roots as the son of a tea seller. 

Aiyar's jibe became the BJP's cue to project PM Modi as a leader with modest beginnings and one the vast Indian middle class could relate to. Shortly, the 'Chai Pe Charcha' [Talk over Tea] became a popular pre-poll campaign for the BJP. 

With Modi as the PM candidate and 'Chai Pe Charcha' as the defining campaign, the BJP won 282 seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, 10 more than the required majority.

Two years later in 2017, Aiyar pulled off another act of snide to hand over the BJP a close win in Modi's home state of Gujarat. He called Modi a 'neech aadmi' (lowly man) and upon ferocious backlash, blamed it on his 'bad Hindi'. 

Rahul Gandhi's 'Chowkidar Chor Hai' comment

The current 'Modi Ka Parivar' campaign is similar to the 'Main Bhi Chowkidar' (I am a Watchman too) moment of the 2019 Lok Sabha Elections. This was when Congress party's Rahul Gandhi targeted Modi as a 'thief' by claiming 'Desh Ka Chowkidar chor hai' (The country's watchman is a thief), about what Modi once addressed him as 'a watchman' watching over the country and keeping corruption in check. 

Shortly after Rahul's 'Chowkidar Chor Hai' comment, the BJP supporters and PM Modi's cabinet colleagues began adding 'Chowkidar' (Watchman) with their names in their social media bios. 

BJP's 'Main Bhi Chowkidar' campaign in 2019

BJP's 'Main Bhi Chowkidar' campaign in 2019

The move galvanised support for BJP's campaign and contributed to PM Modi's return to power in 2019 and increased BJP's tally from 282 to 302 seats in 2019.