A Country with a Dozen PMs
We are currently witnessing the biggest ever human exercise in the form of Indian General Elections 2014. The election is significant because of the sheer extent of the exercise and people are rewarding the exercise by coming out in huge numbers to vote for their leaders. Record breaking turnouts in almost all states are a proof of the trend.
I have always talked about the impact of regional parties in the Indian politics. Just like BJP can't do without Shiv Sena in Maharashtra similarly Congress can't make it without an external support from BSP or SP (it's another matter that both of them provided outside support to the UPA government). Whatever the case may be the importance of regional parties and the impact they make on the regional electorate is huge.
The General Elections 2014, as presented by the media are tilted in favour of the BJP with its charismatic Prime Ministerial Nominee Mr. Narendra Modi leaving no stone unturned to make it a win for himself and the party. Many opinion polls, the authenticity of whom is a subject of debate, have projected that the BJP will be undoubtedly the single largest party in these elections but a tad short of majority, the magical figure of 272 seats. Mr. Rahul Gandhi, the De facto Prime Ministerial candidate for the Congress party has little chances of even crossing a 100 seats mark (out of the 543 constituencies) according to the same opinion polls.
If the NDA remains tad short of majority it will have to include some allies apart from the existing ones like the Shiv Sena, Shiromani Akali Dal, Telgu Desam Party, etc. Governments in India have always been dependent on allies and coalition governments have successfully functioned in the past.
Though forming coalitions with other parties is a majorly post poll and post result activity but the permutations and combinations for such alliances start way to early. The importance given by the big parties to regional leaders and the sheer fan following of these leaders in their respective regions sometimes lead to a scenario where these leaders shed all leaves of practicality and start dreaming of being the PM.
India is full of leaders with impractical PM ambitions. Instead the talk of a third front government is even more impractical because the coalition will never come in effect when a dozen plus parties with all party leaders dreaming to become the Indian PM are coming together to form a government.
And the state with the most number of PM candidates is Uttar Pradesh where both SP and BSP supremos have desired to be the PM of India after the general elections of 2014. The SP banking on Muslim vote bank and the BSP on the Dalit vote bank. The neighbouring state present CM, Mr. Nitish Kumar breathing on the Congress support after his party's 17 year old alliance with BJP broke down in 2013 never fails to express that how able an administrator he is and fully capable of running the country (take the fact in consideration that no opinion poll is giving him more than 10 seats our of total 40 in Bihar).
The question which arises here is that with around 10, 20 or even 30 seats that a regional party aims to gather our of the total 543 seats, how can the party leaders aim to be the PM of a 120 crore plus nation and by surpassing the single largest party which is expected to be just a tad short of majority.
Examples are abound of Ms. Mamata Banerjee from Bengal, Naveen Patnaik from Orissa, Ms. Jayalalithaa from Tamilnadu (who has been aggressively being pitched as the next PM of India through posters and advertisments in Tamilnadu).
There is little doubt in the fact that the single largest party in the General Elections 2014 will need additional allies to form a government but, does this mean that these parties with a maximum of 40 seats out of 543 seats take over the PM candidate of the party getting more than 200 seats and start vouching for their leader to be the next PM?
Or, is it more sensible for these leaders to provide a strong support to the single largest party and vouch for the common interest of the people of India also serving as an automatic check on the single largest party?
I have always talked about the impact of regional parties in the Indian politics. Just like BJP can't do without Shiv Sena in Maharashtra similarly Congress can't make it without an external support from BSP or SP (it's another matter that both of them provided outside support to the UPA government). Whatever the case may be the importance of regional parties and the impact they make on the regional electorate is huge.
The General Elections 2014, as presented by the media are tilted in favour of the BJP with its charismatic Prime Ministerial Nominee Mr. Narendra Modi leaving no stone unturned to make it a win for himself and the party. Many opinion polls, the authenticity of whom is a subject of debate, have projected that the BJP will be undoubtedly the single largest party in these elections but a tad short of majority, the magical figure of 272 seats. Mr. Rahul Gandhi, the De facto Prime Ministerial candidate for the Congress party has little chances of even crossing a 100 seats mark (out of the 543 constituencies) according to the same opinion polls.
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| BJP's PM candidate Mr. Narendra Modi during a rally in Varanasi before filing nomination papers on April 24 |
If the NDA remains tad short of majority it will have to include some allies apart from the existing ones like the Shiv Sena, Shiromani Akali Dal, Telgu Desam Party, etc. Governments in India have always been dependent on allies and coalition governments have successfully functioned in the past.
Though forming coalitions with other parties is a majorly post poll and post result activity but the permutations and combinations for such alliances start way to early. The importance given by the big parties to regional leaders and the sheer fan following of these leaders in their respective regions sometimes lead to a scenario where these leaders shed all leaves of practicality and start dreaming of being the PM.
India is full of leaders with impractical PM ambitions. Instead the talk of a third front government is even more impractical because the coalition will never come in effect when a dozen plus parties with all party leaders dreaming to become the Indian PM are coming together to form a government.
 |
| Nitish Kumar, the CM of Bihar has termed himself more qualified for PM post than Narendra Modi |
And the state with the most number of PM candidates is Uttar Pradesh where both SP and BSP supremos have desired to be the PM of India after the general elections of 2014. The SP banking on Muslim vote bank and the BSP on the Dalit vote bank. The neighbouring state present CM, Mr. Nitish Kumar breathing on the Congress support after his party's 17 year old alliance with BJP broke down in 2013 never fails to express that how able an administrator he is and fully capable of running the country (take the fact in consideration that no opinion poll is giving him more than 10 seats our of total 40 in Bihar).
 |
| Mulayam Singh Yadav, SP supremo and Mayawati, BSP supremo have expressed their PM ambitions cashing in on Muslim and Dalit votes, respectively |
The question which arises here is that with around 10, 20 or even 30 seats that a regional party aims to gather our of the total 543 seats, how can the party leaders aim to be the PM of a 120 crore plus nation and by surpassing the single largest party which is expected to be just a tad short of majority.
Examples are abound of Ms. Mamata Banerjee from Bengal, Naveen Patnaik from Orissa, Ms. Jayalalithaa from Tamilnadu (who has been aggressively being pitched as the next PM of India through posters and advertisments in Tamilnadu).
There is little doubt in the fact that the single largest party in the General Elections 2014 will need additional allies to form a government but, does this mean that these parties with a maximum of 40 seats out of 543 seats take over the PM candidate of the party getting more than 200 seats and start vouching for their leader to be the next PM?
Or, is it more sensible for these leaders to provide a strong support to the single largest party and vouch for the common interest of the people of India also serving as an automatic check on the single largest party?
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