Road To 2024:  Five factors that are disadvantages for the I.N.D.I.A bloc and huge advantages for BJP

The bloc needs to present a credible governance model before the voters and show how its idea of India is different from that of BJP

The Coordination Committee of I.N.D.I.A held its first meeting yesterday at Sharad Pawar’s residence in New Delhi. It has decided to start the process for determining seat-sharing at the earliest, take up the issue of caste census,

hold joint public meetings across the country starting with Bhopal in the first week of October, highlight issues of rising prices, unemployment and corruption by the BJP.

Despite staying together and even expanding the number of parties to 28, the INDIA bloc faces many disadvantages unlike the NDA.

Seat Distribution Difficulties 

The resolution adopted at the last bloc meeting at Mumbai stated that they will contest together “as far as possible”. Parties in the INDIA bloc were winners in 144 seats and runner-up in 328 seats. However, on 44 seats both winner and runner-up belonged to the INDIA group. That makes it 428 seats (80 percent) where the one-candidate, one-seat formula can be adopted.

There are around 130 tricky seats. 20 seats in Kerala (CPM-INC), 21 seats in Punjab-Delhi (AAP-INC), 42 seats in West Bengal where it is difficult to accommodate all the three players TMC, INC and CPM, 37 seats in Uttar Pradesh where Mayawati contested in 2019 as part of MGB, and 15 seats where none of the parties were in the Top Three in 2019.

BJP accounts for 90 percent of the seats and vote share of the NDA bloc. It was the winner and runner-up on 375 seats in 2019, accounting for 70 percent of Lok Sabha strength. Exodus of allies like JD(U), Uddhav faction of Sena, and Akali Dal has further eased matters of seat distribution for NDA unlike INDIA.

Differing Ideologies Make CMP Tough

The bloc needs to present a credible governance model before the voters and show how its idea of India is different from that of BJP. A common minimum programme needs to be finalised as only criticising the Modi government for its failures won’t help, it needs to provide solutions to pressing problems of inflation, unemployment and poverty.

The Congress party is harping on its five guarantees while the AAP has also launched its own five-point formula to make India “vishwaguru”. The Communist parties and socialist forces have an altogether different economic agenda.  All of these need to be harmonised to arrive at the INDIA agenda.

In NDA, there is no need of a CMP, and even if there is it will have the imprint of BJP’s agenda of making India the Number 3 economy by 2027 and a developed country by 2047 when we celebrate 100 years of Independence. The thrust on infrastructure creation as a tool of multiplier effect on economic growth, job creation is likely to continue.

The PM Face

Who will be the Prime Ministerial face of the alliance? Or will it opt for a collective leadership comprising a Congress face and Chief Ministers from regional parties. A section of Congress is staking claim for the PM face as it is the largest party with pan-country presence.

Moreover, Rahul Gandhi gets the highest support from the public to lead any such bloc as per surveys. Many regional parties feel the announcement of a PM face will shift focus away from issues and make general elections 2024 a personality contest.

The Congress party has defeated BJP in state elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Himachal and Karnataka under a collective leadership model, but now a big section wishes to make it a Rahul versus Modi contest. Regional parties have performed well in state elections on the basis of their CM face like Nitish Kumar, Mamata Banerjee and Arvind Kejriwal, but now they don’t want to project a PM face.

For 37 percent voters (highest), the PM face was the most important voting consideration as per Axis-MyIndia exit poll in 2019. With Modi leading the popularity charts, there is no confusion in the NDA camp as to who will be their face for the general elections.

Organisation And Cadre

The leaders at the top have met and resolved differences, but what about lower rung leaders and workers down to the booth level? How will they reconcile to the fact that they now need to canvas together and seek votes for the party which they have opposed for years? This could impact the motivation of cadre and the assumed seamless transfer of votes to each other.

A top-down approach could be futile. Involvement of cadres in seat distribution talks, clear communication as to why these parties have joined hands, confidence building measures and joint meetings/events is the only way out. Else, there could be sabotage of prospects as well as exodus of leaders.

In the NDA fold, there are few new entrants, except for the NCP Ajit Pawar faction. So the issue of coordination amongst cadre of allies does not pose a similar challenge. Additionally, it can fall back upon the parallel, selfless and untiring RSS network for canvassing.

Message, Narrative, Communication

The current tagline “Judega Bharat, Jeetega India” is good but the “how this will be done" is missing. What is their key plank, to end alleged divisive politics of BJP or tackle economic issues?

BJP is creating a narrative that the bloc has ganged up on anti Modism plank, that these ideologically opposite parties are opportunists, and have joined hands just for the sake of power.

This would need to be busted with clear communication which reaches to the booth level, dissemination is important. Also the purpose of the bloc has to be changed from negative to positive.

BJP’s plank for 2024 is getting clearer by the day - making India the No:3 economy globally, India’s improved global standing, implementation of Uniform Civil Code, inauguration of Ram temple, gareeb kalyan et al. Its messaging will be centred around something on the lines of “Abki Baar Phir Modi Sarkar”.

To sum up, the I.N.D.I.A bloc needs to tackle these challenges the soonest in the backdrop of talk of preponing general elections or holding of simultaneous polls.

Amitabh Tiwari is a former corporate and investment banker-turned political strategist and commentator. Twitter: @politicalbaaba. Views are personal, and do not represent the stand of this publication.