Many commentators had already written obituaries for India’s embattled political opposition in the months preceding the country’s election.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) government have been accused of utilizing the entire might of the state against political opponents throughout his ten years in office. Agencies have been accused of bullying opposition politicians into changing sides in large numbers or of harassing and imprisoning them.
In the meantime, the Indian major Congress—the country’s lone major opposition party—was viewed as weak, unorganized, and lacking in leadership. When it was out of power, it stumbled and only managed to win 52 seats in the most recent election, compared to the BJP’s 303 victories.
But this week, India’s opposition bared its teeth for the first time in ten years. When the election results were revealed on Tuesday, the opposition parties—more than 20 of which had united in an effort to unseat Modi—far outperformed exit poll forecasts and general expectations.
With 232 seats, the alliance—united under the slogan INDIA—overtook the BJP in more than 60 seats and prevented Modi’s party from forming a majority government. Rahul Gandhi, the most well-known member of the Congress party, remarked, “We fought as one,” during a press conference on Tuesday.
The future of the INDIA bloc as a unified entity was considerably less promising only a few months ago. More than two dozen regional parties and the Congress party had all agreed to form an alliance. However, due to ego clashes, a number of prominent opposition figures abruptly left to support Modi, and in numerous states, the parties were unable to come to an agreement on seat-sharing arrangements or a single election narrative.
Former Center for Policy Research head Yamini Aiyar stated, “There certainly wasn’t a level playing field for the opposition and they didn’t have a coherent or cohesive chemistry going into the election.”
However, during the course of the seven-week election, the INDIA group started to emerge as a powerful force. In contrast to the 2019 election, the opposition started using conversations about caste, inflation, and unemployment to seize control of the political narrative from Modi. In the end, India managed to significantly reduce the BJP’s support in Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra, two of the country’s most important electoral states.
The Samajwadi party, led by Akhilesh Yadav, and the Congress party, led by Gandhi, formed the INDIA bloc alliance, which worked well to unseat the BJP in Uttar Pradesh.
With 80 parliamentary seats, Uttar Pradesh is the largest and most politically significant state in India. For the past ten years, the BJP has dominated the state. However, Yadav and Gandhi were able to win over large sections of the populace in Uttar Pradesh, especially those from lower caste origins who had previously supported the BJP, as they started working together to promote a narrative that catered to people’s ingrained resentment of long-term unemployment and regional caste-related difficulties.
They were excellent at capturing popular resentment over issues like rising costs and employment as well as worries that the BJP was going to change the constitution, according to Aiyar. “They were able to recognize and capitalize on the growing wave of discontent with the BJP’s absolute and total dominance in the public sphere.”
In other regions of the nation, bloc parties in India also prospered, with several taking advantage of the anti-Modi feeling. Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress picked up seven seats in West Bengal. Despite Modi spending a lot of money to try to win the southern state, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, led by MK Stalin, put up such a strong campaign in Tamil Nadu that they nearly achieved a clean sweep of seats and made sure the BJP did not win any. Kerala, a neighbor, was likewise under the control of the partnership led by Congress.
However, the biggest event for many observers was Gandhi’s emergence as a credible political leader ten years after Gandhi’s death and the Congress party’s turn around. Gandhi was viewed as a weak and hesitant leader, and the party was dealing with existential concerns about its future and a general feeling of discontent among its members before Tuesday.
However, Congress managed to increase its vote share on Tuesday even though it was running for a significantly smaller number of seats, nearly doubling its number of parliamentary seats to around 100. Gandhi easily won both of the parliamentary seats he was running for.
Political analyst Asim Ali stated, “This result was a significant exception. Congress has really been in decline since 1994.” Rahul Gandhi seemed to be experiencing a moment after ten years. Even while he is still far from as popular as Modi, he has been able to convey to voters in this election, unlike in 2019, that he is in it for the long run and will fight for them.
According to analysts, Gandhi now has the responsibility to capitalize on this comeback and restructure his collapsing party. The party has already shifted drastically to the left under his ideological leadership from when it was viewed as an upper-caste, centrist party in earlier generations.
A lot of people think Gandhi will officially lead the INDIA coalition as well. The task of maintaining unity will be difficult, and it is unclear exactly how the coalition will form—whether it would adopt a unifying platform or just act as a makeshift union to oppose Modi in parliament.
Aiyar stated that the opposition’s ability to play the long game will be a crucial litmus test for Modi, who is anticipated to take the oath of office for a third term as prime minister. We have received a highly complicated result from this election: neither Modi’s defeat nor the opposition’s acceptance is total. However, the outcome is crucial for India’s democracy.
