A HAZY PICTURE YET

The Opposition show of bonhomie in Bengaluru at last week’s oath-taking ceremony of H D Kumaraswamy as Karnataka Chief Minister was impressive, warming the cockles of the hearts of all those arrayed against the Modi Government. After all, the gathering of so many leaders on one stage was a rare sight. In fact, the postpoll coalition between the JD(S) and the Congress, which made the Kumaraswamy government possible, was in itself proof that the anti-Modi elements in the polity were ready to shed personal differences to take him on collectively in the general election due next year. But the task would not be easy as it might appear on first sight. To begin with, some in the galaxy of leaders on the Bengaluru stage have no following to call their own. People like D Raja, for instance. Again, Raja’s counterpart from the CPI(M), Sitaram Yechury, like him, might sound articulate on television but he can have little to contribute to any anti-Modi combination outside of Kerala. In West Bengal, it is hard to see the Marxists allying with Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress for taking on the challenge of Modi, that is, unless they want to hand on a platter the entire opposition space to the BJP. Also, the new convert to the Opposition ranks, Chandrababu Naidu, the Andhra Chief Minister and head of the Telugu Desam Party, can ally with the Congress only at his own peril, considering that the Congress is desperate to find a footing in the State after the ill-considered division of Andhra Pradesh to create Telangana. In UP, the Congress has little support at the ground level. So, whether Mayawati and Sonia Gandhi strike a pose for the cameras at the Bengaluru show, the real challenge in the largest State can be mounted only if the BSP and the SP ally together in the next parliamentary poll. In Punjab, it is a direct contest between the Akalis and the BJP on one side and the Congress on the other. The relatively new Aam Aadmi Party might have emerged the single largest opposition in the last Assembly election, but it is fast losing ground. In any case, AAP allying with the Congress against the BJP-Akalis remains in doubt so long as the Congress is opposing tooth and nail the Kejriwal Government in Delhi. In Bihar, the Congress-RJD are already in alliance and there is nothing much any other non-NDA party can offer to augment the anti-Modi alliance. In several other key States, the Congress and the BJP are in direct fight, such as in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, etc. In Tamil Nadu, there is hardly any space for outsiders, with the rival DMKs and various other caste-based offshoots keeping it a closed affair. In Kerala, though the BJP is struggling to make inroads, it essentially remains a fight between the two old fronts, led respectively by the Marxists and the Congress. The picture in Maharashtra is getting confused, though in the end it is likely that the Sena and the BJP will stay together while the Congress and the NCP might join hands. In Odisha, it is still advantage Naveen Patnaik since both the BJP and the Congress are fighting over the opposition space. In Telangana, the ruling TRS is in the pole position with the BJP trying to edge out the Congress as the main opposition.

Yet, if an omnibus coalition of all opposition parties were to fructify ahead of the Lok Sabha poll, it is quite likely that in parts of the country, there could be an accretion in the anti-Modi votes while in a much larger part of the country the fear of a ‘khichdi sarkar’ might in fact induce more and more voters to plump for Modi as prime minister. Indians do not like hotchpotch governments, especially at the Centre. Besides, Modi continues to be by far the most popular leader, his ratings at the national level being far ahead of any one on the Opposition benches. In government, he may not have performed wonders, but he has not done badly, either. Fixing the broken plumbing of the system and generally toning up the administration, he has steered the economy with competence despite that gross misstep about ‘notebandi’ and a hasty implementation of the GST. And, importantly, there have been no corruption scams. Voters do not have a long memory. In the remaining one year of his government, he can be expected to come up with some popular programmes and schemes while the Opposition leaders engage in coalition-building, reconciling their seemingly irreconcilable differences and egos. It is still an open election, difficult to call at this state, though by popular consensus Modi continues to enjoy a huge head-start.