2024 – A Year That Surprised Us!

With just a couple of days left for this year, as I ruminate on how the year went, there is one thing that stands out. Which is that – 2024 has been a year of surprises. Clearly, going by the book was not the flavour this year! Why am I saying this?

The mother of all surprises was the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Same time, last year, the Bharatiya Janata Party winning handsomely and Narendra Modi coming back was almost a done deal. Modi did come back but not with an overwhelming majority like in 2014 and 2019 but with the support of coalition partners. I don’t think anyone expected this sort of pyrrhic victory and therefore the result came as a huge surprise.

In the end of Dec 2023 in what was touted as semifinals, in the state elections, BJP retained Madhya Pradesh with a fantastic win (after 3 terms in office) and wrested back Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan from the Congress.  In Jan 2024, the Ram Mandir at Ayodhya was inaugurated in what was seen as a huge accomplishment for the BJP and Modi in particular. The whole country was engulfed in a Ram wave and the positive sentiment around it. When the elections were announced in March, it was widely expected that the BJP will sweep the polls once again so much so that its slogan of Abki Baar 400 Paar became plausible.

The result however, was an Anti-Climax as I have mentioned earlier. The BJP lost the Ayodhya seat which was the epicenter of the Ram wave. Smriti Irani lost the Amethi seat to Kishori Lal, whose claim to fame was his proximity to the Gandhi family. In Uttar Pradesh, BJP’s tally was lower than that of the opposition! If these were not enough more surprises followed. In Rajasthan, where the BJP took the state back from the Congress just a few months ago and where in the last 2 Lok Sabha polls the BJP almost swept completely, the party lost 11 seats! In Tamil Nadu, where the BJP invested a lot of political and financial capital, the party once again drew a blank. At the end, with just 240 seats down from a tally of 303 on its own, the party had to take the support of its allies to come to power.

At the same time, in Odissa, where simultaneous elections to the state and the centre took place, the BJP dislodged Naveen Patnaik and his party from the state. Its tally of 20 seats out of the total 21 Lok Sabha seats would come handy to reach the 240 seats number. While it was expected that the BJP would do well in the Lok Sabha elections, no one expected to win a majority on its own in the state.

In the state elections of Haryana in September 2024, it was widely expected, forecasted and predicted by experts, pollsters, pundits, and punters that Congress was winning the state handsomely and the only question remained was, if it would be an Aandhi, Toofan or a Tsunami. The result however was a total surprise.  The BJP retained the state with a silent wave and that too with a comfortable majority and the biggest win among the past 3 elections.

In November 2024, the world was presented with another surprise. In the US presidential elections, Donald Trump won handsomely and comfortably to become the President once again. While it was expected that it would be a close fight after Kamala Harris was announced as the Democrat candidate, at the end the results were once sided. Imagine, Donald Trump who was voted out in 2020, coming back for his second term in the back of all the cases against him was a real surprise!

Back to elections in India, in December 2024, the Maharashtra state elections threw up a complete surprise. Before the elections, in the back of a very good performance by the opposition Maha Vikas Agadi alliance in the Lok Sabha polls just a few months back, it was expected that the alliance had an edge and will win by a slender margin. However, on the results day, it was surprisingly a no contest fight. The BJP led Mahayuti election which got battered badly in the Lok Sabha polls just in May 2024, not just bounced back but won with more than a three fourth majority.

There were surprises in store for India from the neighbourhood as well. In August, the Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheik Haseena was forced to flee the country due to massive protests led by students. What is surprising is the emerging tilt of Bangladesh towards Pakistan – a country from where it broke out and got its individual identity politically and geographically.

Not just in politics, the trend of surprises extended to sports and specifically Cricket too.  This year, New Zealand toured India and can you believe if in a home series, the Indian team got thrashed 3-0! If that was a surprise of a shocking variety, what followed was a surprise of a pleasant type. India as I write this, is touring Australia, unarguably the most competitive Cricket team in the world, for the Border-Gavaskar Test Series. In the back of the humiliating home series rout, India was expected to get routed in Australia as well. However, what happened in reality is stuff that dreams are made of. In the 1^st test of the series, having bowled out for just 150 runs in the 1^st innings, India went on to win the match by 295 runs!

In the field of fine arts and music too, the veil of surprise extended. In March 2024, the Music Academy announced that it would be conferring its coveted Annual Sangeetha Kalanidhi Award to the controversial Carnatic vocalist T.M. Krishna. While that in itself is not a surprise, what followed were of surprise to me. T.M. Krishna, who for the past 10 years riled against the Sabha Culture and boycotted the Sabhas during the Annual Margazhi music season, gleefully declared that he was chuffed to receive the award. While this itself was surprising, more followed. For the 1^st time in my knowledge and memory, a few Carnatic contemporaries came together and expressed their displeasure in public and even went to the extent of boycotting the Music Academy!

At the age of 81, one of India’s finest original and natural composer Ilaiyaraaja continues to surprise all of us. In 2024, he announced that he recorded his first ever full symphony which would be a first for an Indian. At an age when most people retire to the woods, Raaja continues to inspire with his raw energy and passion to do something new all the time.

So, 2024 has been a year of surprises some pleasant and some not so. As I end this piece, I wish the new year 2025 to throw only pleasant surprises at us. On that note, wishing you all a New year of Health, Hope and Happiness!

Image courtesy: www