Personal rivalries and ideological differences weaken India’s opposition ahead of this year’s elections
Several key leaders have defected from the INDIA coalition, which was created last September, highlighting its weaknesses. Although the Indian National Congress signed deals for seat sharing, it is still at odds with some regional parties. Experts note that India’s opposition parties have also been undermined by police probes but especially their failure to develop a share narrative and use the economy to attract voters.
Milan (AsiaNews) – A few months before the elections to the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian Parliament, set for April and May, the parties opposed to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) appear to be disunited and their alliance in disarray.
Back in September last year, they had come together under the acronym INDIA (Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance) in contrast to "Bharat", the Hindi word for Indian nation used by BJP leaders.
The Indian National Congress (INC) has agreed to share the seven seats in the National Capital Territory of Delhi with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), led by its Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal – it struck a similar deal with the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.
However, this success sowed confusion elsewhere. In other states, local leaders, like the chief minister of Punjab, where the AAP is in government and the Congress in opposition, came out against any alliance with the Gandhi family and its party, while talks for seat sharing in other states stalled due to personal rivalries and ideological divisions.
Last month, Mamata Banerjee, the popular chief minister of West Bengal and leader of the Trinamool Congress Party, announced that her party was going to run on its own.
In late January, Nitish Kumar, chief minister of the northern state of Bihar, pulled out of the INDIA alliance to side with the BJP, sparking accusations that he had switched sides to improve his chances of victory.
Kumar’s Janata Dal responded by saying that the INC was more interested in strengthening itself than the opposition, a view shared by the other regional parties, who criticised the INC for fielding candidates in most districts, even in states where it is weak.
“From the start, the opposition alliance had to be more than just electoral arithmetic. But most parties are putting their own interests ahead and are looking to consolidate their positions in the states where they are strong. They are not ceding space to each other,” said Gilles Verniers, Gilles Verniers, a scholar of Indian politics and a senior fellow at the New Delhi-based Centre for Policy Research.
By contrast, “Modi’s party has been successful in exposing distrust within the opposition alliance. It is cannibalizing the opposition parties from within by engineering these defections and draining them from the ground,” Verniers added.
In recent months, government agencies have also conducted a series of arrests and probes against political leaders who had joined the INDIA coalition, while investigations of those who stood with the BJP have been put on the backburner.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal himself could be arrested, APP said in a statement, if the party confirms its seat-sharing agreement with INC.
By and large, the opposition lacks a shared narrative to counter Modi’s. Elected for the first in 2014, the incumbent prime minister presented himself as an outsider and played up the Hindu religious card, moving away from independent India’s secular roots.
While INC leader Rahul Gandhi is breathing new life into the party with his marches, many doubt that his newfound popularity can be turned into votes, because even issues such as rising unemployment and economic discontent have not found enough space among the opposition’s talking points.
India uses the first-past-the-post system – whoever gets most votes in a single district wins. In 2019, the BJP won 37 per cent of the vote, but took 303 out of 543 seats, against 52 for the INC.
In the upcoming elections, the National Democratic Alliance, which includes the BJP and other parties, wants to win 370 seats.
The opposition seems “to lack the fire, the will to win, which the BJP have in ample quantities,” said Jerath, a political commentator. “Today, unless there is a popular uprising against the ruling party over economic distress, Modi looks well set to win a third term comfortably.”
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