A typical election scenario unfolds as
the Congress and the BJP, the two main contestants in the coming Lok Sabha
elections, have firmed up alliances with regional parties. Never before
regional parties were so important as in the coming general elections. The most
important alliance is forged in Maharashtra where expectedly Congress and NCP
joined and old poll allies BJP and Shiv Sena have entered in poll pact. Lately,
the BJP has uneasy relationship with the Sena. The alliance in Maharashtra also
comes at a political cost for the BJP as it had to concede equal status to Sena
even after it won 122 seats in 2014 compared to Shiv Sena’s 63.
Barely days after BJP-Sena inked a
poll pact for Lok Sabha and Maharashtra assembly elections, Uddhav Thackeray
triggered a major row in the saffron alliance by invoking the ‘parity’ clause
in the agreement and demanding that BJP and Sena share the CM’spost for 2.5
years each. However, BJP leader Chandrakant Patil had made it clear that the
CM’s seat would not be shared and would go to the party that had most MLAs.
Sena minister Ramdas Kadam ratcheted
up tension further by threatening that the Sena would call off the alliance if
it didn’t get the CM post. If the Shiv Sena insists on the unreasonable demand,
the alliance may run into trouble and may even break. This will evidently help
the Congress-NCP poll pact.
The BJP’s focus has now shifted to
working out the fine-print of agreements in Bihar and Tamil Nadu; ironing out
differences in Northeast; and prospecting for possible pre- and post poll
alliances in Kerala and Andhra Pradesh.
Uttar Pradesh and Bihar have become a
tight contest against a united opposition. In UP smaller parties have been
flexing muscles to become king maker. The RLD has got feelers from the Congress
even as the former union minister Ajit Singh-led party is widely expected to
join the Samajwadi party and BSP alliance. The Bihar deal is oldest and was
stuck in December 2018. The poll pact between CM Nitish Kumar and BJP will
continue whereby Nitish demanded a respectable share. For the BJP which had won
22 of the 40 seats in the state, this meant scaling down its ambition. Yet it
agreed to contesting on 17 seats and giving the same number to Nitish. The
Congress has firmed up alliance with Lalu Prasad Yadav’s party. Reports from
Bihar say Laloo and Congress combine is better placed as, having been in jail
for years, Laloo has evoked sympathy of voters. Nitish also suffers from
anti-incumbency factor.
In Tamil Nadu, both the Congress and
the BJP have entered into poll pact with the two Dravidian party. Expectedly
Congress joined hands with the DMK which appears to have better poll prospects.
The Congress will contest nine seats and DMK will field its candidates along
with smaller parties for the remaining 30 constituencies. The Congress will
also contest the lone Lok Sabha seat from Puducherry.
The BJP has joined hands with ruling
AIADMK. The alliance between the two parties is said to be marriage of
convenience. With the absence of a charismatic leader, AIADMK is rudderless but
retains a large vote base nurtured over decades by Jayalalithaa. BJP hopes to
cash in on that.
The BJP has suffered a setback in the
Northeast with Asom Gana Parishad walking out of the NDA over the citizenship
amendment bill which intends to grant citizenship to non-Muslims from Pakistan,
Bangladesh and Afghanistan.
The BJP’s alliance with Akali Dal
remains intact in Punjab. Of 13 Lok Sabha seats from Punjab, Akalis got 10 to
contest in the and the BJP three. The numbers will remain same in the coming
Lok Sabha elections.
The BJP’s Kerala unit is in talks with
Bharatiya Dharma Jana Sena, an outfit with following among the OBC Ezhava
community. They want half a dozen seats and discussions are on. The BJP may
also support a couple of Independent candidates in the state. Kerala has 20 Lok
Sabha seats and despite fielding candidates in 18 in the last Parliamentary
election, the party could not win even a single seat.
The BJP also expects to gain in
Odisha, Telangana and West Bengal—three states where it is pitted against
regional players and has worked tirelessly to expand its presence in the last
five. (IPA Service)
The post BJP, Congress Stitch Alliances As Lok Sabha 2019 Nears appeared first on Newspack by India Press Agency.
