The Pulse | Politics | South Asia

India’s Opposition: Stranded Between Alliance and Disarray

The general discontent in society is palpable; the opposition can see it. But the INDIA bloc has not yet been able to convert the discontent in society into votes.

Indian Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi with youngsters affected by examination paper leaks.

In its first meeting after the five state legislative assembly elections held in April-May this year, the Opposition INDIA bloc has recommitted itself to launch a coordinated fight against the Modi government.

The landslide victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Assam and Bengal, and the minor inroads it has made in the southern states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, may seem ominous for the opposition parties in India. Yet, the ruling party is facing a difficult moment in its 12-year rule today with high fuel prices, inflation and growing unemployment. 

This is the governance weakness that the opposition INDIA bloc wants to leverage. 

A political campaign launched by the “Cockroach Janata Party,” born out of a satirical meme on social media, attracted 22 million followers on Instagram in no time. That points to deep anger and despair with the regime, especially among the youth.  

The general discontent in society is palpable; the opposition can see it. Protests over corruption in the education sector, especially the NEET (entrance exam for medical colleges) paper leak controversy, and frequent examination related failures under the National Testing Agency and the Central Board of Secondary Education, have fueled public anger. 

Surprisingly, however, such public anger has not translated into electoral losses for the BJP. Nor has the opposition been able to convert the discontent in society into votes as yet. The momentum generated by the BJP failing to secure a majority on its own in the 2024 general election seems to have been frittered away by the opposition. 

The Congress victory in Kerala, which increased the number of Congress-ruled states to four, is politically significant. However, it neither establishes the Congress as a credible national alternative to the BJP nor does it halt the BJP’s continued expansion across the electoral geography of India. In a parliamentary democracy, persistent public dissatisfaction would ordinarily strengthen the principal opposition. However, that has not happened in India.

A change of government through anti-incumbency is a normal feature of democratic politics. Curiously, however, the BJP has repeatedly defied this logic. BJP-ruled Gujarat remains the most striking example, where the party has retained power for decades. This phenomenon of the BJP defying anti-incumbency becomes even more difficult to explain when one finds that governance and development indicators of  many non-BJP states are as good or even better than those of the BJP-ruled states. 

The BJP’s success in the recent elections seems governance-neutral. The economy is not doing well and a few supporters of the government have also voiced their concern. Society at large is restive, with examination scandals and corruption scandals leading to Gen Z protests. 

The opposition parties have been unsuccessful in channeling this anger and frustration against the government to mount a political challenge. 

One-party-dominance is not new to Indian politics. The Congress party enjoyed such pre-eminence for several decades after independence. However, there is something new and unusual about the emerging dominance of the BJP over the last decade. Although the 2024 general election revealed the vulnerabilities of the BJP – it could not secure a majority in parliament on its own – it bounced back, trouncing the opposition in a series of state elections, regaining lost momentum.

The usual explanations offered for the BJP’s dominance include allegations of electoral manipulation, institutional capture, a compromised Election Commission, misuse of investigative agencies, and the advantages of incumbency. While some of these concerns may contain elements of truth, they remain politically ineffective unless backed by convincing evidence and translated into a persuasive public........

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