The Mahaghatbandhan or the heterogeneous agglomeration of different regional parties with the sometimes overt and many times covert support of Congress has only one agenda – somehow stop Modi from winning again. So naturally many questions arise as to the context and the character of such a convenient coalition among these political parties.
- Unlike the national uproar against Indira Gandhi in 1977 post emergency led by the JP movement, there is no uproar against Modi as he continues to be the most popular and acceptable national leader, heads and shoulders above anyone else and despite the herculean efforts by Opposition and their friendly Mainstream Media to foist and fabricate a scam through Rafale, the fact is the record of Modi Government is clean and scam free. So what is that these leaders are banking on to unite against the most popular leader of the country – is it his popularity that is intimidating them, or is it their own question of survival that is getting threatened, or is it their desperation that someone could be so corruption free and if he continues to be in power there will be no chance for any corruption opportunities? Or is it that he is so different from them and doing real good for people like making India a clean place, with electricity to every village and household, clean cooking gas to poor, universal health care and all that is threatening them? They can’t even find one case of minority harassment despite their desperate attempts to even project that as the threat. So what is the real reason behind such a Grand Alliance?
- Granted that Modi should be removed for whatever reason and assuming that they are successful in doing so in the coming elections, what next? Have they mentioned what is their agenda beyond Modi Hatao or Remove Modi? On what basis they would run the government? On the basis of the same old coalition compulsions aka coalition compromise dharma? That each party would pull apart in different tangents based on their narrow and parochial interests to safeguard their interests than the national interests? Haven’t we seen in the examples of such coalitions in the past? Why see what is happening in Karnataka now and the tears Kumaraswamy is shedding for his ill-treatment and bullying by Congress? Or with just 2 MLAs how Mayawati is making MP government now dance to her tune? What is the agenda for this alliance beyond Modi when they don’t even have an idea who is going to be the PM who will lead this rainbow coalition? Or are they hoping a Manmohan Singh kind of puppet PM to be remote controlled?
- Is this really a grand coalition of all anti-BJP parties? The two main parties in Telangana and Andhra (TRS and YSRCP of Jagan) aren’t part of it. TRS claims another Federal Front like this one anyway. AIADMK and many other Tamil parties like PMK are not part of it. BJD of Odisha is not part of it. And many of the parties who are in this rally including TDP, TMC, DMK or even SP/BSP are opportunists who could always break away and ally with anyone who could form the next government including BJP if their conditions are met. In many of the states these parties are in direct conflict with Congress and fighting against each other. So how would this really work out? Based on a seemingly unrealistic and arithmetically attritional one if allied pre-poll or a loosely and tacitly tied coalition which would re-align based on post-poll outcome in their own best self-interests? Either way without a strong case against Modi there is no real cohesive theme for them to fight for and show the electorate.
- Each one of them fight either BJP or Congress in their own turfs and not beyond their region. Even assuming an alliance with Congress there is no understanding except with DMK that Rahul Gandhi would be the PM of the coalition. If Congress allies with these and don’t fight alone there is no chance for them to be the single largest party even. So there is no way Congress can dictate to have their PM until they get close to 200 seats. So how will they ensure that the numbers would add up by fighting Congress in many places one on one and claiming to have an alliance with Congress at the national level? If Congress is giving outside (or inside) support to a coalition government led by someone else one can imagine what would be the state of such government – just look at Karnataka how JD(S) is made to dance and kept on the tenterhooks each day with a threat of either pullout or the risk of defections.
- Wherever one makes a pre-poll alliance there would be a compromise on seats. Like there will be only 38 BSP candidates now as opposed to 76 or earlier. So how would they manage the tickets? What about those who don’t get tickets? How will they manage the rebels? Forget the candidates, have they thought about the cadres? How would Yadav cadres work for a Jatav candidate who fought tooth and nail until yesterday? If that is the situation with cadres what about the voting public?
