Watch Nidhi Razdan: Modi govt faces crucial state elections in India

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00:00Crucial state elections coming up in India over the next couple of months are going to

00:07be very important for all political players.

00:10For the BJP-led government at the centre, it's important to crush this narrative that

00:15having fallen short of an absolute majority in the Noak Sabha polls, that they are a weaker

00:20government.

00:21It's especially important because in recent days there have been a series of U-turns by

00:26the Modi government, under pressure from the opposition and from its own allies.

00:30Coalition politics is clearly not easy and so the BJP is desperate to change the narrative.

00:36For the opposition, winning these state elections becomes crucial especially because a. they

00:41actually do have an edge in all the states going to the polls and b. they need to keep

00:46up that momentum of having done better than many expected in the general election.

00:51And now when you break down the state of play in each of the states where elections

00:56are going to take place over the next couple of months, you can see that on the ground

00:59it's actually a much more interesting battle and not entirely one-sided.

01:04In Maharashtra for example, we'll have to see how it plays out.

01:08There are all new permutations and combinations with parties having broken up, being split,

01:12people having switched sides.

01:14How that will play out will be important.

01:16How much sympathy Uddhav Thackeray gets will be important.

01:19In Haryana, the BJP is very much on the back foot but the Congress is facing a lot of internal

01:24factionalism and infighting.

01:26So could that cost the Congress party at the end of the day?

01:29We'll have to wait and see.

01:30Jammu and Kashmir is having its first assembly election in nearly a decade and after the

01:35big changes to Article 370 on 5th August 2019.

01:39And while the Congress and the National Conference have a formidable alliance to take on the

01:43BJP and its proxies, at the end of the day, the role of smaller parties and independents

01:49could also be very crucial.

01:51So the only thing certain about the election in J&K is the uncertainty.

01:56And then there is Jharkhand, where again, the JMM will be hoping that Hemant Soren's

02:01incarceration in an alleged money laundering case will bring them sympathy.

02:05But at the same time, the BJP's got a shot at the arm with former CM and JMM leader Champai

02:10Soren joining their ranks and the party hoping that anti-incumbency and corruption allegations

02:16against several JMM MLAs will actually play to their advantage.

02:20This is the state of play at the moment and how this pans out over the next few weeks

02:25and months is something to watch out for.