What is on the agenda of the meeting of the I.N.D.I.A bloc scheduled to be held in New Delhi on Tuesday? It seems the selection of a convener for the alliance has been ruled out. So what will be discussed: finalising coordination committees, setting of the agenda, or will the difficult topic of seat sharing be broached? The meeting, originally scheduled to be held in the first week of December, was postponed to 19 December post the declaration of the results to the recently held Assembly elections. Till now the buzz is that all the parties that comprise the I.N.D.I.A bloc are attending the meeting. But there has been a sea change in the mood from the last meeting held prior to the elections. The spring in Congress’ step, which it had acquired post the win in Karnataka earlier this year, is gone. Ironically, even though the Congress snatched the state of Telangana from the BRS, that win is not being counted when determining Congress’ status in the I.N.D.I.A coalition. The loss of the three major Hindi heartland states, of which it was ruling two, and the third one, which it was confident—some say over-confident—of winning, is too glaring to be ignored. Together these states have 65 Lok Sabha seats, compared to Telangana’s 17. Out of this 65, the BJP has 61. This has to be seen in the context of the 2018 Assembly elections, when the BJP lost all the three state elections, in spite of which it won these 61 seats. The problem for the Congress is, as of today, the party cannot even imagine to pull off a similar turnaround. Hence, while the BJP’s loss in 2018 was a setback, it was only at the state level. The looming figure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi helped the BJP overcome all hurdles at the national level, enabling it to sweep the Lok Sabha elections in 2019. So where does the Congress go post the loss in the Hindi heartland? Nowhere, if the allies have it their way. They know that in this game of survival of the fittest, Congress isn’t fit enough to even compete in many states. It is a burden on any regional party that it allies with. The allies have learnt it the hard way, be it in Uttar Pradesh or Bihar. Both the Samajwadi Party’s tally in 2017 (47) and the Rashtriya Janata Dal’s (75) in 2020 Assembly elections would have been better if they had not gifted the Congress a substantial number of seats to contest from in Uttar Pradesh (100) and Bihar (70), respectively—the majority of which the Congress lost. Once the SP shed the Congress baggage in the 2022 Assembly elections, it was able to put up a better fight and won 111 seats in UP with a 32% vote share, thus establishing itself as the primary opposition to the BJP.
With the loss in the Hindi heartland, it is the bargaining power of the Congress that has taken the biggest hit. Until the results came out, there were reports that the Congress would be pushing for an “equitable” seat sharing in the states where the regional parties are strong. It was too eager to seal its “big brother” status, thanks to the lone win in Karnataka. Hence, all the initial talk about the party willing to play the junior partner to its regional partners, was just that—talk. Hence, when Akhilesh Yadav says that the recent election results demolished Congress’ ahankar (ego/pride)—as he did last week at the ITV Network’s India News Manch 2023—he is essentially demolishing the Congress’ “big brother” claim.
The Congress has lost the leverage it thought it had over its regional partners. It is upper hand for Congress’ “allies” in the I.N.D.I.A bloc, one of the reasons why the Aam Aadmi Party has declared that it would fight all of Punjab’s 13 seats on its own. Chances are it would do the same in Delhi. Mamata Banerjee has said that it’s the Congress’ arrogance towards its partners that helped the BJP win the three Hindi heartland states. Her party leaders are saying that it’s not the Congress but their Trinamool Congress that should be leading the I.N.D.I.A bloc, because it is only their party that will certainly win a decent number of seats in the Lok Sabha elections. The TMC is largely right about its potential to win a substantial number of seats, because most of the other regional parties in I.N.D.I.A are looking a bit shaky, even M.K. Stalin’s DMK, as anti-incumbency is rising against it in Tamil Nadu. The only thing that matters to the regional parties is to have a complete grip on their own turf. They may posture about building a national front and taking on the BJP, which they believe will impress certain voting groups to gravitate towards them thinking they can pose a serious challenge to the BJP, but their concentration will be on maximising their own performance. In this scheme of things, the Congress has a marginal presence. The Congress will be lucky if it can manage to get from its I.N.D.I.A partners, a handful of seats to contest from.