DMK, Trinamool Defeats Leave I.N.D.I.A. Bloc Shaken and Stirred

There are just 9.5 lakh voters in Puducherry and its enclaves with a little over 1,000 polling booths for the Union Territory’s 30-seat Assembly. Yet, the stakes were high when polling took place on April 9. This was an election where the INDIA bloc sought to make a statement that south India was “out of bounds” for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies. Puducherry mattered and was not just an adjunct to Tamil Nadu which the Opposition alliance was confident of retaining

On the face of it, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and Congress agreed to fielding 16 and 13 candidates each. But there lay a catch. As many as six Congress candidates filed nominations on seats allotted to DMK and refused to withdraw nominations. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi visited Puducherry and met some of the “rebels” and obliged them with photographs. The calculation, it would seem, was that Congress was confident of winning at least some of these seats and was determined not to cede the chief minister’s post to the DMK.

Regional Satraps humbled

The results demonstrated just how flawed the strategy was. Incumbent chief minister N R Rangasamy’s NR Congress won 12 seats, BJP 4, AIADMK 1 and Latchiya Jananayaka Katchi 1 adding up to a comfortable majority of 18. DMK won 5 and Congress managed just one seat. In Tamil Nadu, where the INDIA alliance also crashed to defeat, Congress won all of five of the 27 seats it contested as part of the DMK-led alliance. The results are part of a consistent pattern that illustrates how Congress squandered the gains of the 2024 Lok Sabha election when it won an unexpected 99 seats, winning several seats in direct contests with BJP.

After the 2024 Lok Sabha results, DMK and Trinamool Congress led the way in disrupting Parliament and opposing government business. While Congress has joined the fray in the well of the House in both chambers, the two regional parties – along with Samajwadi Party (SP) often provide the lung power. They are INDIA bloc’s “muscle” – aggressive and vocal. The numbers in Parliament remain unchanged and the alliance is highly unlikely to review its conduct but things are no longer the same. The confidence of ruling two large, populous states stands deflated and from now on the heckling and hectoring will lose its sting. Rather, as the recent split in the Aam Admi Party (AAP) demonstrates, survival would well become a preoccupation.

Congress loses Momentum

The 2024 bump has flattened out. After the Lok Sabha result, Rahul declared Congress’s campaign over the “threat” to democracy and the Constitution had struck a popular chord. BJP’s “400 plus” claim, he argued, evoked fears that a super majority will mean that constitutional protection to weaker sections will be scrapped. The Congress leader made it a point to hold a copy of the Constitution aloft during speeches to claim that the party’s campaign succeeded in weaning scheduled castes and tribes and backward communities from the NDA fold.

Caste factors did play a role in Uttar Pradesh where the INDIA bloc won more seats than NDA but it was not the only reason for BJP’s reverses. Besides the reasons varied from state to state as regional and local factors took precedence rather than a strong “national” narrative. This was not necessarily due to Dalits being stampeded towards the Opposition by fears of losing reservations. BJP missed a trick or two in candidate selection too.

Losing the Script

An incorrect analysis of why the INDIA bloc made gains led to Congress ignoring what mattered when state elections came along. A strategy marked by an over-dependence on Jat votes while not addressing festering inner-party rivalries wrecked Congress prospects in Haryana. In Maharashtra, BJP closed the gaps with allies, upped its game and won a famous victory. Delhi followed with BJP ousting Aam Admi Party (AAP) from office. Late last year NDA not only retained Bihar but improved its score lines by inflicting a heavy defeat on the Rashtriya Janata Dal-led alliance. It only failed to win Jharkhand and while it was not expected to win in Jammu and Kashmir, it retained its support in Jammu.

The West Bengal and Tamil Nadu contests were tougher tests. Regional parties had been more successful in thwarting BJP and DMK and Trinamool were strident opponents of the Modi government. Both have been humbled and now face long tenures in Opposition. In office since 2011, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee made anti-BJP politics the centerpiece of her campaign. As the election progressed, she grew increasingly intemperate in her comments but the BJP top brass refused to rise to the bait. In Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister M K Stalin warned that fires reminiscent of the 1960s anti-Hindi agitation would be lit if the Modi government’s plans to link the rollout of the women’s quota with a new delimitation based on the 2011 Census were implemented.

Centre Vs States a Smokescreen

The bid to create a smokescreen of a “Centre versus States” battle failed and voters in Tamil Nadu and West Bengal dumped DMK and Trinamool and with that the idea of INDIA bloc as an “alternative” to the BJP stands badly fragmented. The two parties are pillars of the Opposition alliance that projected itself as the “resistance” against BJP. Their precipitate decline – along with Congress’s poor track record – has all but dismantled the coalition of regional satraps and the main opposition party that hoped to halt and roll back BJP’s advance.

Congress’s role as the fulcrum of the INDIA bloc has been compromised by its abandonment of centrist politics and embracement of caste, minorityism, profligate populism and Left-woke anti-development postures. Rather than being a moderating and balancing influence holding the center in an alliance where parties like DMK, Trinamool and Samajwadi Party pursue avowedly sectarian interests, Congress comes across as a rudderless ship. Occasional successes like the win in Kerala due to anti-incumbency against the Left Front are no substitute for a coherent political programme.