Is India Heading for Unequal Fight in 2024 Elections?

General elections in India are only a few months away. The contest between the ruling front and the newly formed Opposition alliance is increasingly looking unequal, nowhere near the battle of titans Indians elections have been over the past several decades. In large measure, this perception is triggered by the outcome of the elections held late last year in four states that were seen as an indication of a larger trend in the national elections of this year. BJP, the ruling coalition leader, won in three of four, surpassing forecasts. Notwithstanding the hardship of the people of the country and joblessness, the Opposition parties failed to convert such sentiments into their advantage in the polls.

The triumph of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) spearheaded by Prime Minister Modi has inspired a renewed trust in the ruling government. High-level corporate executives who had blamed the BJP-led alliance in private chats until then have now begun to make statements in praise of Modi, both in public statements and private conversations. Perhaps they sense that the outcome of this year’s general election is a foregone conclusion with poll momentum disproportionately favouring Modi and company. Maybe they feel emboldened by the trend in stock markets that tend to back stability.

True, election results are unpredictable, just as the outcome of the recent state elections in India was, but certain factors are indicators of which way the wind is blowing. One, of course, is the enthusiasm of corporations, which, as of now, are gung-ho about the incumbent prime minister and his stature in comparison with opposition politicians. Collectively, they supply a huge chunk of the money that is used up for election campaigns. The BJP received Rs 259 crore or 70.69% of the total donations received by all political parties from electoral trusts in 2022-23.

In mid-2023, several Opposition parties joined hands with an ambitious goal of forging an anti-BJP coalition with the aim of dislodging Modi from power. And yet, the news coming from the entity conceived as a counterweight to the ruling NDA is nothing to cheer about. Rather than inspiring confidence among its previous vote banks, the so-called I.N.D.I.A. alliance, now a grouping of 28 disparate political entities, including the Congress, appears to have scared off potential supporters over time thanks to internecine wrangling.

If the I.N.D.I.A. bloc had been a cohesive entity, the BJP-led formation would have sensed a challenge. So far, it is not so, and fissures within suggest that the Opposition combo is in a bad spot when it comes to fair accommodation of multiple interests.

If the Congress – also called the Grand Old Party – had won more than or at least two states of the four states that went to the polls in late 2023, it would have had the legitimate right and bargaining capacity to demand a greater share of seats from the rest of the I.N.D.I.A. bloc in the Lok Sabha polls, including in states where its allies are stronger than the Congress. But losing polls has come with a price for the party controlled by the Nehru family. Constituents of I.N.D.I.A., especially regional parties, are not playing ball.

In West Bengal, I.N.D.I.A.'s ally Trinamool Congress, steered by state chief minister Mamata Banerjee, isn’t ready to share any more than two Lok Sabha (lower House of Parliament) seats from the state. Out of 543 seats in the Lok Sabha, 42 are from West Bengal. In Maharashtra, which sends 48 lawmakers to the Lok Sabha, I.N.D.I.A. partner Shiv Sena (UBT) hasn’t yet arrived at a seat-sharing formula with the Congress. In Punjab and Delhi, I.N.D.I.A. bloc allies Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) are busy taking digs at each other. There are no signs that both these entities are likely to end their hostilities anytime soon.

For its part, the Congress is not keen to usher in more cohesion within I.N.D.I.A. Sample this: the grand old party cold-shouldered a proposal by Mamata Banerjee and AAP chief and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal to name Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge as the PM candidate. They argued that Kharge is a quintessential politician who rose through the ranks and is a Dalit. Fielding him would mean a decent political move to revive the opposition’s chances of building a narrative around pitching a Dalit for PM. No Dalit has ever been prime minister in India till date. Kejriwal brought in the perspective that Dalits are a stable and cohesive vote bank across India besides the Brahmins and the Muslims. Other communities do not have such strong allegiance or commitment to getting their folk elected, goes the logic.

Without a doubt, Kharge as the PM face of the I.N.D.I.A. bloc would have breathed new life into the Opposition’s campaign and put the ruling party on the defence, at least in a small measure, if not a big one. The Opposition, which currently lacks a message to counter the ruling BJP and its tireless campaigning to pull in votes across socioeconomic segments, would have had a messenger who himself would have been the message. It would have been a masterstroke of a political narrative. Interestingly, close to 17% of Indians are Dalit and the “give Dalits a chance” chorus would have helped the anti-BJP front grab a much-needed electoral stimulus.

In sharp contrast to I.N.D.I.A. and Congress, the ruling party BJP is connecting with people at a fast clip through its various programmes to win over those who were beneficiaries of its national welfare schemes. The Opposition campaign doesn’t seem to be any match for the BJP’s. Rather, one-upmanship among I.N.D.I.A. bloc members is hurting Opposition unity – they are yet to solve the seat-sharing crisis and come up with a prime ministerial face. The I.N.D.I.A. bloc has met four times since it first convened in June 2023 in Patna. They met thrice afterwards: in Bengaluru on July 17-18, in Mumbai on August 31 and September 1, and in Delhi on December 19. Their resolve to fight the elections and work together “as far as possible” to avoid any split of anti-BJP votes has so far remained robust in theory and weak in practice. In all likelihood, the bloc would fight the polls without a PM face, much to the delight of the ruling dispensation that invariably hard-sells the strong leader image of Modi as a sign of stability and good governance.