Page 29 - English Tehelka Issue 6 - March 31, 2018

column politics

(where elections are due soon) and Rather than Third Front – an alliance of non-BJP
From Kohima to Kutch, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, where a healthy, and non-Congress parties. Such an idea
is already floating in Karnataka where
elections will be held towards the end
JD (S), BSP, NCP and the Left parties are
of 2018. Going by the tone and tenor
Saffron all the way! of BJP’s government formations in the incorruptible and contemplating in this regard and the
forward-looking
latest to give such a call is Telangana
North-Eastern states, some experts call
it Congress-isation of the BJP because
from Arunachal Pradesh to Manipur, alternative, the BJP Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao
(KCR), who is reportedly seeking to give
As the BJP now rules 21 of the country’s 29 states, major as well as regional and now in Meghalaya and Nagaland, has cast itself in the 2019 Assembly elections in Telanga-
Hard Opposition parties have no choice but to pull up their socks, leave behind their the BJP has used the opportunist’s the same mould as na a national perspective.
rulebook for somehow getting into the
According to media reports, KCR is
LIne differences and come together if they have any desires to control the saffron surge driver’s seat. its bête noire, the anxious to usher in “qualitative change
While pointing out inability of the in the country’s politics” by calling for
Anil Singh ith its electoral more Lok Sabha seats in the North-East BJP to cobble a joint declaration with Congress a non-Congress, non-BJP platform
victory in Tripura than it had in 2014, when it had won its alliance partner in Tripura, many entailing TRS, TDP, YSRCP, DMK and
and formation 10. These experts further opine that it experts also opine that the party played Kamal Haasan’s fledgling party in Tamil
The columnist is of governments would perhaps help the BJP offset some both sides of the fence in Nagaland to grapple with pressing sub-local Nadu, the Left in Kerala, and possibly
Executive Editor of in Nagaland and of the losses it is bound to suffer in and then picked up the one with the concerns, such as influx of contiguous JD(S) in Karnataka. While averring that
News24 news W Meghalaya in alli- the Hindi belt (Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, higher number of legislators and in tribes, overlapping claims for land, KCR has revived the idea of a coalition
channel. The views ance with local parties, the BJP has put Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh) where Meghalaya, with just two seats to boast balancing the aspirations of identity led by southern regional parties to halt
here expressed are the six out of eight states of North-East India it won 149 seats out of a total of 160 the of, it played the kingmaker with its bag and development among indigenous the BJP’s ingress into the south, some
author’s own in its kitty. Put together the BJP is now in last time. of tricks and opportunistic stabling tribal and non-tribal population. These political observers say KCR appears
power, either directly or through an al- The electoral victory in the North- with parties aggressively seeking the experts also bemoan the fact that to be working on the assumption that
liance, in 21 out of India’s 29 states. Party East assumes special significance for redrawing of boundaries with neigh- rather than a healthy, incorruptible and anti-incumbency in many BJP-ruled
president Amit Shah, recently said, “We the BJP because it comes against the bouring states, also controlled by the forward-looking alternative, the BJP states will not fetch it an absolute ma-
have an MP in Ladhakh and Kerala. We run of play in recent months when the BJP. Cautioning that an unscrupulous has cast itself in the same mould as its jority in 2019, so a Third Front would be
have a government in Kohima and in party returned to power in Gujarat but approach to power will complicate bête noire, the Congress. in a position to form the government
Kutch”. Influence of the BJP, which was with a significantly reduced majority governance in the North-East, ex- at the Centre. While recalling the role
once confined to the so-called cow belt in terms of seats while retaining its perts also warn that the BJP will have Third Front of TDP founder late N T Rama Rao in
or Hindi-speaking states, is now, in Prof. vote share and lost by-elections to two The BJP’s juggernaut of electoral stitching together such a front, called
Rajni Kothari’s words ‘a dominant party’ Lok Sabha seats in Rajasthan. The BJP • saffron surge Within less than four years, the triumph has spurred many regional the National Front, in 1989, one analyst
in every region of the country, barring has pinned high hopes on Karnataka saffron surge is prominently visible everywhere satraps to call for the formation of a says that the rise of BJP in the North-
the deep south and a portion of the east. East has forced regional party leaders
Within a short span of less than four like KCR to plan a strategy to counter
years, the saffron surge is prominently the BJP in their states.
visible everywhere. Many political analysts feel that
the so-called Third Front comprising
The Saffron Surge regional satraps from the South cannot
Sources within the BJP rank the party’s stop BJP’s political juggernaut in 2019
recent victory in the North-East as its and coming together of regional par-
most significant electoral story since ties from the Hindi-speaking states is
it won the 2014 Parliamentary elec- indispensable. The recent bonhomie
tions. Some political observers opine between the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP)
that most of BJP’s electoral gains in and the Samajwadi Party (SP) for the
the North-East region had started parliamentary by-elections for Gorakh-
manifesting in 2016 when the party pur and Phulpur seats held on March
won Assam for the first time in 2016 and 11 is a good beginning if it succeeds. The
Manipur for the first time in 2017 and Congress offer of support was spurned
in Arunachal Pradesh where the BJP by the Samajwadi Party. Ensuing as-
came to power in 2016 by engineering sembly polls in Karnataka will also be a
a large defection from the Congress. litmus test for the viability of the Third
With regard to significance of the BJP’s Front.
electoral victory in the North-East, some
experts give credence to party president Congress’ Conundrum
Amit Shah’s interview to a national daily Startling continuous fall in electoral
in early January this year where he had fortunes of the Congress is attributable
said that his party was expected to win to a vast array of factors like disconnect

Tehelka / 31 march 2018 28 www.Tehelka.com

28-30 Column-Anil Singh.indd 2-3 14/03/18 5:02 PM