"Spirited fighters' : Regional party politics - Do they lack the temperament of upholding principle-based politics?

Winning counts !

New Delhi: 
A robust BJP riding on Narendra Modi's popularity in two general elections has changed the game. 
Regional politics is in for a tough time; and this makes the battle more exciting. But they are the 'spirited fighters'. However, do they lack the temperament of loving the nation or upholding principle-based politics? Are things so much personality-focused and fashioned just to win elections?

Blogger in Parl premises

Even in recent five-state polls, they were vital stakeholders in most cases leaving Congress licking the wounds. Even in Assam, the AIUDF is a key player. Having contested only 20 seats, they won 16 making it 80 percent strike rate.

The Congress strike rate was just 31 percent after winning only 29 seats out of 94 seats contested.

DMK won Tamil Nadu and Mamata-led Trinamool Congress is again in power in West Bengal - where the BJP had made significant grounds and here too the Congress acceptability has nosedived. Both the communists and the Congress could not open their accounts in this large state with 294 assembly seats. 

But the communists did well to win over Kerala yet again and deprived Congress the 'conventional' change of guard of every five years. One can, thus, never say whether it is a ‘new beginning’ or the end of regional parties  in India. 

Just when the going is tough, the regional forces strike back. But often when things look so smooth and there is a beeline of PM-aspirants, they suffer huge losses. The truth of the matter is as long as social and regional inequalities or imbalances remain, the regional parties will remain on the scene.

The old ones may get replaced by new leaders at times though. 

Four regional parties – created after coming out of ‘parent’ Congress party – the NCP of Sharad Pawar, Trinamool Congress of Mamata Banerjee, Y Jagan Mohan Reddy’s YSR Congress and Telangana Rashtriya Congress (TRC) of  K Chandrashekhar Rao are now in power in as many states. 

So much has been the ‘power’ of regional players that Akali veteran Surjit Singh Barnala almost became the Prime Minister in the mid-1990s. Luck favoured a mofussil protagonist like H D Deve Gowda (of then united Janata Dal) and his colleague I K Gujral, whose 'play safe' card gave him the post.

Even the characteristics of other regional parties – and original claimants to the Third Front - like TDP, Samajwadi Party and Janata Dal – have changed a lot. 
The TDP under N Chandrababu Naidu is passing through challenging times in more ways than one.

From token opponents of big brother’ national parties to true representatives of regional aspirations, small or regional parties are certainly more than kingmakers now. They are being wooed by the Left parties and Congress. At times, the BJP is also not far behind ready to strike deals. 

Janata Dal (U) of Nitish Kumar is a reliable partner now for the saffron party though Shiv Sena has walked away from its embrace. In Uttar Pradesh, where assembly polls are due by March 2022, the roles of both the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party and BSP of Mayawati have undergone a sea change.

In fact, Mayawati faces a crucial poll next year as BSP performance in the last assembly polls was dismal. In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the BSP tally from UP was ‘zero’. A grand fall for a leader, who only seven years ago (in 2007) brought in social engineering with the Brahmin support base and had stormed to power in UP. 

In the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, BSP admirers were perhaps not wrong to dream that ‘Behenji’ may become Prime Minister.

CPI-M stalwart Prakash Karat had endorsed this view at a public rally. But in politics, nothing is permanent except change. The Congress did unexpectedly well in 2009. In 2014, it was the Moditva phenomenon. 

In 2019 just before parliamentary polls, Samajwadi Party stalwart Mulayam Singh Yadav could smell the 'truth' and told Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Lok Sabha that he (Mulayam) was sure that the BJP-led NDA would return to power yet again. 

And his words had turned prophetic.

In 2014, the then BJP Rajnath Singh had told me that his party’s alliance with BSP in the 1990s with a six-month power sharing formula was a blunder. “This alliance had harmed BJP’s prospects in Uttar Pradesh for years. I was one of the few to oppose such a move,” Rajnath had said.

Holding among them 123 seats in the 12th Lok Sabha or almost 24 per cent of popular vote-share, regional parties lived through ‘federalism’ in the real sense as they forged strategic poll alliances either with Congress or BJP, but not compromising their ideologies and self interests.

Of course, the regional parties did not let the national parties storm their strongholds. This was a healthy development, many thought as it was impossible in India’s vastness to have a system that is highly centralised.

“Either you accept it or learn the bitter way that the roles of regional parties cannot be underestimated,” George Fernandes, then the Samata Party chief, had said.

Likes of George Fernandes and even his compatriot, Nitish Kumar, used to say that regional representations could in effect bring decentralisation in real sense.

They will be again in focus in 2022 assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh, Manipur and Goa among others.

Tail Piece:

Some regional parties were born in the pre-independence era. The Jammu and Kashmir National Conference of Abdullahs was floated way back in 1938 by renaming a faction of the Muslim Conference by its founder Sheikh Abdullah. 

The present day National Conference, however, came into being in 1975 after the Indira-Sheikh Abdullah Accord.  

Congress and Punjab: A story in itself

On Punjab 'Vax scam', Hardeep Puri joins issue with Rahul, targets 'Congress culture'

New Delhi: "Rahul Gandhi ji asks where is the vaccine for our children. That vaccine is in the garbage in Rajasthan and profits are being made on that vaccine in Punjab," thus spoke Union Minister and BJP leader Hardeep Singh Puriat a media conference.

"..... This is the culture of Congress,” Puri directed his ire against the Congress party for abusing vaccinesincluding dumping them in Rajasthan and on the other hand question the centre and BJP leadership about efficacy of the system in vaccines supply and reaching them to the consumers. 

Citing the data of Covid-19 vaccination in Punjab, Puri said the figures as revealed show that the rulingdispensation in the northern state is profiteering by overcharging for the vaccines. 

One dose of Covishield vaccine, which costs ₹309, has been sold at ₹1,560 through private hospitals, Puri alleged. 

"These people are giving a dose of Covishield which they bought for ₹309 to a private hospital for ₹1,000 and as per yesterday's data they are selling it for ₹1,560," he said. 

The Union Minister alleged that the Punjab government has procured 4.29 lakh doses of Covishield at Rs 13.25 crore. 

Puri's press conference is being seen as a deliberate plan by the BJP to field the Union Minister Puri, also a Sikh,

against the Congress regime in Punjab. The crucial state would go to the polls by February-March 2022 and the battle this time poses to be an exciting affair as the Congress is faced with intense internal squabbling.

Moreover, the Akali Dal, which was for long BJP's ally, has walked out of the NDA last year over the farm laws.

Was there any political message when Puri said, "I am not raising these questions as a union minister but a karyakarta of the party (BJP) from Punjab" - remains to be seen. 

"When we raised it, Captain (Amarinder Singh) said withdraw the order, which tells you the order was fishy. Why was the decision taken in the first place?" Puri said.

The Akalis have been the most dependable alliance partner of the saffron party formally since the 1990s and 'informally' even during Emergency days in 1975.

 In 2020, the saffron party leaders have been ‘interacting’ with S S Dhindsa, a senior Akali Dalleader who quit the Badals-led party. The BJP also sought to reach out to another Akali dissident R S Brahmpura, whofloated Akali Dal (Taksali).

At the media conference, Puri said it was "shameful" that the Congress government in Punjab was trying to garner a profit. This shows the "incompetence" of Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh's administration, he said.