Toppling the saffron behemoth?

As we move closer to 2024, let’s conjecture the scenarios for that year’s parliamentary election. Will the opposition succeed in dislodging the saffron behemoth? 

Let’s take a look at the statistics first. In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, the BJP cornered 37.76 percent of the national vote share which translated into 353 seats for the NDA coalition. The Congress was left with 19.7 percent of the votes, up by miniscule percentage points after its exit from power in 2014. It’s a 62.24 percent expanse that the Congress and the Opposition will vie for among themselves or against the BJP.

It’s not a small space if the Congress and the regional entities put their heads together, strategize and draw up a blueprint; it is expansive enough to pull the BJP down. However, the notion of Opposition unity is debunked the moment the Congress appropriates for itself the leadership mantle without having the commensurate ground strength.

In Bihar, the Congress hung on to the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) to catch its breath. It brought nothing to the table and snapped its links to go solo. In Jharkhand, the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha is the dominant constituent in the “secular” alliance. The Congress exists on its own in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh which constitute the rest of the Hindi heartland.

In the West, the party is a straggler in Maharashtra’s ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi and turned over to sitting out in the opposition in Gujarat for years. In the East, it forfeited ground to the Biju Janata Dal in Odisha, the Trinamool Congress Party (TMC) in West Bengal and the BJP in Assam and the other north-eastern states. The south still has oases to draw sustenance, notably Karnataka and Kerala, while in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, the Congress has lost the will to strike back against the regional forces and an incipient but resolute BJP. The impression that the Congress is content to stay afloat without drawing first blood has both emboldened and frustrated the regional forces, some of whom it befriended in desperate times.

Can the Congress legitimately use the refrain that state-level entities are out to help the BJP by encroaching on its space? Mamata Banerjee, the TMC chief and West Bengal Chief Minister, gave the Congress latitude when she had an alliance with it, until she had enough. She recently said she cannot wait eternally for the Congress’ leaders to get their act together because the vacuum had to be filled. The idea that the Opposition cannot hang together as a formidable entity unless the Congress is at the spearhead does not hold true any longer. 

How long can the TMC or the RJD wait for the Gandhis to appoint a president instead of functioning under the ad hoc arrangement that is in place presently? Lalu Prasad, the RJD chief, out on bail and canvassing in a by-poll in Bihar, realised the futility of holding the Congress’ hands forever and decided to go alone. Is it possible to enter the battlefield without a commander-in-chief? 

The joust within the Opposition raises another question: do parties not have the right to contest elections and carve out their spaces even on uncharted land as long as they fulfil the legal and constitutional prerequisites? Why must a TMC be accused of “helping” out the BJP if it wishes to fight in Goa? Why must a similar charge be levelled against Asaduddin Owaisi for using Bihar or UP as national launch pads outside Telangana?

Mamata Banerjee never concealed her national ambition, not after keeping West Bengal at the end of a hard-won battle against the BJP, in which the Congress and the Left Front together were unsparing in their attacks on her. With or without a political strategist like Prashant Kishor for back-up, she was clear that she would not remain confined to the east. The point merits emphasis because since Mamata attempted to breach Goa, the speculation was that Kishor used her as a “proxy” to hollow out the Congress for allegedly putting him down when it seemed as though he would join the party. Mamata, Lalu, Akhilesh Yadav, Stalin and YS Jagan Mohan Reddy don’t need Kishor to fight their battles. 
In the Opposition spectrum, the CPI(M) is caught between a rock and a hard resting place. It’s out of West Bengal and Tripura and has only Kerala for succour. The CPI(M)’s predicament was reflected in a recent meeting of the central committee which broadly endorsed the 2018 political line, advocating cooperation with the Congress and the “secular” parties to counter the BJP. 

In a first, the Kerala wing—that would otherwise be focussed on containing the Congress—agreed that a line up with the Congress in, say, West Bengal, would enhance the party’s “secular” image and comfort Kerala’s minority voter