AN ALLIANCE OF NECESSITY
The numbers suggest that the Modi-led NDA is practically unbeatable in a head-to-head poll fight. Will Opposition parties team up to take them on?
AS THE LEADERS OF INDIA’S top political parties set the wheels of their 2019 ambitions in motion—either through rallies in election-bound Uttar Pradesh and Punjab or through photo-ops with Dalits in Gujarat—the key question is this: will the next Lok Sabha elections be fought on a national versus national platform or a national versus regional plank? The answer is crucial in determining the kind of Opposition that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will face two-and-ahalf years from now, and whether he will be able to muster the numbers required for a second term.
The latest india today-Karvy Mood of the Nation (MOTN) survey offers some interesting insights into Indian politics and the people at the forefront of it. Broadly, the import is that the BJP-led NDA is far ahead of its national rival, the Congress-led UPA, and is also comfortably ahead of regional parties—parties that form a uniquely Indian crucible called ‘Others’. The MOTN survey suggests that the NDA would get 40 per cent of the vote share if Lok Sabha elections were held today, up 3 percentage points from the last survey, six months ago. This rise costs the UPA one percentage point, and ‘Others’ two percentage points.
However, that is not to say that the NDA can afford to rest: a potential ‘Federal Front’—a coalition of the UPA and regional parties—could emerge as the principal challenger for control of the national government. This would be the case if the UPA and large sections of Others— who currently cancel each other out in several states by directly competing with each other—could somehow form a united Opposition.
But is this Federal Front a pipe dream, a rickety political structure threatened by ego clashes and endangered by a collision of interests? Or is there a glue that can somehow hold it together? When asked which coalition could challenge the NDA in 2019, 31 per cent of the survey’s
respondents suggested it would be the UPA. Twenty-five per cent said it would be the Mahagathbandhan— the amorphous group of former foes who rose to power in Bihar in collaboration with the Congress, which is hoping to spread its wings by winning over regional leaders such as Mamata Banerjee, J Jayalalithaa, Naveen Patnaik, Arvind Kejriwal, and Mulayam Singh Yadav/ Mayawati. This cobbling together of numbers to fight a common enemy is not new to Indian politics. It was the Congress that was at the receiving end in 1977 and 1989, and the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led BJP in 1996; but the short tenure and shoddy performance of each of those patchwork governments indicate that keeping such an alliance together is no walk in the park.
While 14 per cent say that Arvind Kejriwal of the Aam Aadmi Party is the man to lead the Mahagathbandhan, 11 per cent back Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, and 8 per cent opt for Trinamool Congress chief Mamata. It’s here that the Congress comes in as a possible binding force, because 23 per cent of respondents still feel that Rahul Gandhi is the best alternative to Modi. When you add his mother Sonia’s 9 per cent and his sister Priyanka Vadra’s 4 per cent to the mix, the Gandhi family’s grand total swells to 36 per cent.
Should the Mahagathbandhan go it alone, or does it make more sense to form a Federal Front? The numbers suggest the latter would stand a better chance in 2019. But lots of moving parts will have to fall into place for this dream (or nightmare, depending on your political leanings) to become a reality.
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