By Dr. Gyan Pathak
Opposition INDIA Block is coming back on negotiation table on December 19, after a long gap of 80 days since Mumbai Meet on September 1, a crucial time that it has already lost, without moving forward on the resolution made, including launching joint rallies across the country and finalization of seat sharing by September 30. The opposition Meet therefore needs to pick up the threads where it had left them that resulted into heavy loss of surging political public sentiment in its favour.
Congress in particular greatly lost in the November state elections in the key Hindi heartland states in Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, and Madhya Pradesh, in the former two it could not retain its power, and in the later one its hope of wresting power was shattered. It not only disheartened the Congress but also other opposition leadership, several of them even excused themselves to participate in December 6 meeting called by the Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, who was then forced to defer it for December 19.
Chief cause of loss was lack of solidarity among the INDIA alliance constituent political parties, apart from there was, no joint strategy, no joint rallies, and even a weak counter political narrative to take on the BJP and the party’s mascot PM Narendra Modi under whose name the elections were contested and won. Obviously, when the INDIA alliance partners would meet on December 19 in Delhi, they will have to come to terms with their weaknesses as well as the BJP’s advantages in the communally surcharged high pitch campaign of PM Narendra Modi and his associates. They should even overcome their grief over the loss in the state elections in these three states, since BJP’s impressive gains just camouflaged and veil the BJP’s sharply falling vote share compared to the Lok Sabha election 2019, that clearly indicate the lost public illusion with respect to PM Modi’s rule.
In September Mumbai meet, the India alliance had resolved to initiate seat-sharing arrangement for the Lok Sabha election immediately and concluding the same at the earliest in a collaborative spirit of give and take, which was supposed to be completed by September 30. However, after initial talks among the leaders of opposition political parties in the alliance it could not take off in the right earnest. The chief reason was the overconfidence of the Congress that it was drunk with after the win in Karnataka election in May in which it was able to render humiliating defeat to the BJP despite the high pitch communal political campaign by RSS-BJP clan and the PM Modi’s so called charisma who campaigned intensively in the state.
The party just avoided seat-sharing talks with other political parties not only for the state elections but also for the Lok Sabha elections, in the hope that they would will win the three states and will have more bargaining power during seat sharing talks with other political parties. Congress attitude was not categorical in the beginning which led to seat sharing hope among political parties such as Samajwadi Party. The seat sharing talks between SP and Congress was disrupted in Madhya Pradesh with a bitter note when the Congress leader Kamal Nath said “Akhilesh wakhilesh chhoro” which irked SP leader Akhilesh Yadav, which followed by acrimonious exchange of words between Congress and SP leaders. The exchange of words also with other political party leaders gave clear message to the electorate that INDIA alliance was not so united as to successfully take on the BJP.
It is therefore obvious that December 19 INDIA alliance meet need to giver clear and categorical message to the electorate that they are united against the anti-people and communal agenda of the ruling BJP and the RSS to instill hope among the common people that all is not over yet, and they can rescue and bring back the Constitutional democracy in the Country from the clutches of the RSS-BJP clan under the premiership of PM Narendra Modi.
Since the time is running out for the opposition INDIA alliance, they need to start seat sharing arrangement, and if possible they must workout the principles and the modalities in the December 19 meeting itself, and shed all their inflated aspirations and hopes in favour of the ground political reality in every state. Mumbai meet had resolved that seat sharing arrangement would be made as per the political situations in every state where the leaderships of the various parties would decide the matter. However, the situation later showed that state leadership of the Congress and other political parties are at loggerheads. It makes the seat sharing arrangement to be a complex and time taking exercise, which needs to be expedited without further loss of time by the central leaderships of the various parties.
As for organizing joint public rallies by the INDIA alliance partners across the country on issues relating to public concern, the leaders participating in the meet must resolve their differences as we have seen during the recently concluded state elections. It was announced that there would be joint rallies beginning with one in Bhopal, however, Madhya Pradesh Congress leader Kamal Nath and other prevented it on their belief that they could defeat BJP on their own, which ultimately proved untrue. No political party in the INDIA alliance should therefore entertain such a belief to the extent of preventing even cooperation and coordination among the all anti-BJP political forces. Joint rallies should be chalked out in large numbers in every corner of the country to give clear message of their solidarity.
However, this cannot be done without a clear common minimum programme of the INDIA alliance. Now the time has come for the opposition to come out with their chief political narrative against the RSS-BJP narrative to successfully take on PM Narendra Modi. The political narratives of the opposition parties so far are numerous preventing emergence of any dominant opposition political narrative.
Once the political narrative is spelled out there would be the question of how to proceed ahead with coordinated efforts apart from the joint rallies, such as real time exchange of communication among the opposition leaders, joint media strategies, and political campaigns with every means possible. It may enable the opposition to overcome the disruption in their campaigns on account of shortfall of electoral funds as against big fund to be employed by the BJP and also the likely raids, summons, seizures, and arrests of opposition leaders by central investigating agencies such as ED, CBI, NIA, and Income Tax Department. INDIA alliance could navigate only through their hope and frustration and the present political complexity only by deft and honest united strategy to successfully take on PM Modi in the Lok Sabha election 2024. If they fail, that would substantially damage them and the very character of the democracy in India. (IPA Service)
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