IPA Newspack
  • Home
  • now
  • politics
  • business
  • markets

IPA /

IPA Special

IPA Special

Congress Becoming Relevant Again In Tripura On The Eve Of 2023 Polls

By Sagarneel Sinha

The joining of two BJP rebel MLAs — Sudip Roy Barman and Ashish Kumar Saha — to the Congress has, no doubt, given a boost to the grand old party  in the north-eastern state of Tripura. It is a homecoming for the two leaders, as they were associated with the Congress for a long time in the past. This is a jolt to the ruling BJP. Only one year is left for the assembly elections in the state. In fact, some more saffron party MLAs are expected to join the grand old party.

Sudip has been a well known leader of the state. He along with 5 other MLAs had left the grand old party in 2016 to join the Trinamool Congress as they were unhappy with the Congress for striking an alliance with the CPI(M) led Left Front in West Bengal. At that time TMC, after returning to power under the leadership of Mamata Banerjee with a majority of its own, was looking to spread its foothold in other states too. Tripura, being a Bengali majority state, was the immediate target of TMC and Mukul Roy, who was then second-in-command in the party, was given the charge of the state. In fact, Mamata’s party has always targeted the north-eastern since 1999. TMC was successful in poaching Sudip, the then main opposition leader of the state, and 5 MLAs of the grand old party as the former has a history of often poaching the leaders of the latter in West Bengal. Thus TMC without even contesting elections became the main opposition party in the state assembly.

However, Sudip Barman and the other 5 MLAs couldn’t stay more than a year with TMC. It was said that one of the main reasons was the differences of the Sudip camp with TMC, which is actually a West Bengal based party. The leaders felt that the leadership of TMC didn’t understand Tripura’s politics. Another main reason was, of course, the growing popularity of BJP in the northeastern state and thus joined the saffron party, just months before the 2018 assembly polls. Sudip camp particularly has a good following in Agartala and neighbouring areas. As a result, their joining came as a boost for BJP, which swept those areas and the party that suffered the most was the Congress, which got even less than 2% of vote share in 2018 polls. It was because most of the Congress voters voted for the BJP to bring an end to the 25 years of CPI(M) rule in the north-eastern state.

Coming to the present, Sudip camp felt that they were ignored by the BJP. So, it was expected that the Sudip camp would leave the saffron party. True that BJP itself has ignored the rebel leaders. But the saffron party can’t deny the fact that this desertion is likely to hurt its prospects. The joining of Sudip camp has made the beleaguered Congress relevant in the state politics. And this is not good news for the BJP just one year ahead of the assembly polls.

Already a chunk of BJP voters, who went from Congress, are dissatisfied with the saffron party. This was seen in 2019 Lok Sabha polls when the grand old party sprang a surprise by pushing CPI(M) to the third place and garnering a vote share of 25%. However, this euphoria didn’t stay long with the Congress and it got a big jolt when the then party president Pradyot Debbarman left the party over differences with the party high command on the issue of implementation of National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Tripura.

Congress, no doubt, has been able to give a jolt to the BJP. But this is a big jolt for TMC, which had been wooing Sudip camp since it came to power in West Bengal for the third time. In the recent Tripura civic polls, TMC got 16% vote share and the party became so overconfident that it started running propaganda of coming to power in the 2023 polls. The fact that got hidden in the propaganda run by pro-TMC media was that the party got help from the backdoor by Sudip camp, whose aides became TMC candidates in Agartala Municipal Corporation, where Mamata’s party emerged as the second largest party. A large section of TMC’s votes in the civic polls came from traditional Congress voters. Now with the resurgence of the Congress, any party that is likely to suffer the most is, undoubtedly, TMC. It can be said that here Congress has dealt a big blow to TMC, whose supremo Mamata Banerjee, after becoming chief minister for the third time in Bengal, has been trying hard nationally to take the place  of the grand old party. Another party that is likely to benefit from the internal crisis of BJP is the CPI(M), which is still the main opposition party in the state. The Left has a committed vote bank and this was evident in the recent civic polls, where it improved its performance compared to the 2019 polls.

In the 2018 polls, the grand old party failed to open its account in Tripura. Last time it was in 1977-78 elections when the Congress failed to open its account. In fact, the Congress was completely ruled out for 2023 polls. But now, with the returning of the Sudip camp to the Congress, TMC is slowly losing its relevance while the grand old party is back in the game for the battle of 2023, where the other major players are BJP, CPI(M) and Pradyot’s TIPRA Motha. (IPA Service)

IPA Special

BJP Leaders Have Started Course For Overthrow Of Nitish Kumar Regime

August 17, 2022
IPA Special

Decoding My Seventy-Two Years In Independent India-Part Two

August 17, 2022
IPA Special

Reining In ‘Freebies’ Needs Thorough Debate

August 17, 2022
IPA Special

Release Of The Eleven Imprisoned Rapists Of Bilkis Bano Is Atrocious

August 17, 2022
IPA Special

Heyday For Geopolitics Of Eurasian Transport

August 17, 2022
IPA Special

Jagdeep Dhankar Had A Chequered Career Involving Many Political Parties

August 17, 2022
IPA Special

NATO Expansion Into Finland And Sweden A Danger To World Peace

August 17, 2022
Happening Now

DMK moves Supreme Court over ‘freebies’ term scope

August 17, 2022
Politics

R’sthan Cong Rs 20 lakh aid for slain Dalit boy’s family

August 17, 2022
Politics

Gehlot vs Pilot fight resumes ahead of polls next year

August 17, 2022
Happening Now

Azad quits J&K Cong panel within hours of appointment

August 17, 2022
Happening Now

Meira Kumar says ‘Chamar’ used as slur against her father

August 17, 2022
IPA Special

Prime Minister’s Five Pledges On Independence Day Mean Very Little To Poor

August 16, 2022
IPA Special

Labour Movement Has Lost Its Earlier Striking Power

August 16, 2022
IPA Special

Decoding My Seventy-Two Years In Independent India

August 16, 2022
IPA Special

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Achhe Din’ Now Needs 25 Years More

August 16, 2022
IPA Special

Donald Trump Is On Dock Over FBI Seizures Of Classified Documents From His House

August 16, 2022
IPA Special

Bihar Developments Are Going To Have Impact In Uttar Pradesh In 2024 Polls

August 16, 2022
IPA Special

Amrit Mahotsava Has Been Turned Into A Big Jumla By Sangh Parivar

August 16, 2022
IPA Special

For Global Arms Dealers, Russian War In Ukraine Is A Big Bonanza

August 16, 2022

An appeal

The legacy of IPA, founded by Nikhil Chakravartty, the doyen of journalism in India, to keep the flag of independent media flying high, is facing the threat of extinction due to the effect of the Covid pandemic. Only an emergency funding can avert such an eventuality. We appeal to all those who believe in the freedom of expression to contribute to this noble cause.
Click here to learn more

Share

Reply

  • 0
More on IPA

BJP Leaders Have Started Course For Overthrow Of Nitish Kumar Regime

August 17, 2022 3:33 pm | IPA Staff

  By Arun Srivastava   It was certainly not a coincidence that on the day Prime   Minister was addressing the Independence   Day rally, Amit Shah...

IPA Special

Decoding My Seventy-Two Years In Independent India-Part Two

August 17, 2022 3:32 pm | IPA Staff

  By Nitya Chakraborty   In 1960, at the global level, the most important development was the World Conference of the   communist parties, the result...

IPA Special

Reining In ‘Freebies’ Needs Thorough Debate

August 17, 2022 3:30 pm | IPA Staff

By Dr. Gyan Pathak   The ongoing freebies case in the Supreme Court of India has reached an interesting stage with the DMK seeking to...

IPA Special

Release Of The Eleven Imprisoned Rapists Of Bilkis Bano Is Atrocious

August 17, 2022 3:30 pm | IPA Staff

By Sushil Kutty   Monday, the eleven   persons   who gang-raped Bilkis Bano during the 2002 Gujarat communal riots walked free. The panel that let them...

IPA Special

BJP Leaders Have Started Course For Overthrow Of Nitish Kumar Regime

in IPA Special
Aug 17, 2022   ·  

Decoding My Seventy-Two Years In Independent India-Part Two

in IPA Special
Aug 17, 2022   ·  

Reining In ‘Freebies’ Needs Thorough Debate

in IPA Special
Aug 17, 2022   ·  

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Follow us on
Up Next: Rising Suicides By Unemployed Sounds The Alarm Louder
©2020 -2021 India Press Agency, All Rights Reserved
Newspack by India Press Agency
Posting....
logo
  • Home
  • now
  • politics
  • business
  • markets