The I.N.D.I.A bloc lies in tatters after the electoral drubbing that Mamta Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress received in West Bengal; followed by its split in all directions. And the similar electoral decimation of DMK in Tamil Nadu assembly polls. Not that it was in any good shape prior to that and for which regional leaders such as Ms Banerjee and Mr Sharad Pawar are entirely to be blamed. These regional leaders who had a significant role to play refused to comprehend the humongous challenge that Mr Narendra Modi and his dispensation has all along been posing to them. They simply looked the other way under the weight of their inflated egos and misplaced ambitions. The result is for everyone to see. 

The same Mamta Banerjee who abhorred the I.N.D.I.A combine, till losing the chief minister’s chair and left stranded by defections and splits, desperately rushed to Delhi to attend a meeting of the combine which took place after a gap of two years. The decision of the DMK, the second big component after Trinamool Congress, to leave I.N.D.I.A, has made it more precarious with Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party having already met with a similar fate. 

That explains the compulsions of the changed political scenario and the enfeebled street-fighter that she has been rendered to. But what has not change is the attitude of some others such as the Left Parties that continue taking potshots at the Congress for the party’s stand against former Kerala chief minister Mr Pinarayi Vijayan and CPM during the assembly elections. Instead of preparing ground for the serious challenges awaiting them ahead, they still chose the other way round at the risk of further political annihilation. 

Two serious incidents which coincided with the I.N.D.I.A meeting should have an alarming effect on the opposition parties including Congress. Firstly, the attitude of the two Returning Officers (ROs), in Jharkhand and........

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