On completion of its nine years in office, the UPA was flooded with gloomy forecasts about its future. The surveys on the mood of the nation—sponsored by various media houses—had one thing in common. They all predicted that BJP-led NDA would have better prospects than the UPA if elections were to be held to Lok Sabha now. However, there was a rider. The NDA would not be able to garner a majority on its own and it would have to wean back its erstwhile allies to stake a claim to form the government.
The Indian politics today is much more complex than what it was quarter of a century ago. The political scenario has undergone a sea-change from the heady days of Janata Party in 1977 and Janata Dal in 1989 and 1996.
Post-emergency, a conglomerate of parties woven into Janata Party had ousted Congress from power for the first time. But, the experiment lasted less than three years. Again, Janata Dal, under V P Singh, grabbed power in 1989 when the Congress, despite being single-largest party, decided to sit in the opposition. In 1996, a loose federation of regional parties led by Janata Dal formed the government with outside support of the Congress.
Post-1998, the BJP-led NDA came to power with the help of newfound allies who displayed their lust for spoils of office under a saffron dispensation. There was an AP angle to the formation of coalitions in 1989, 1996 and 1998. TDP founder NT Rama Rao was the spirit behind the National Front that anointed VP Singh as PM.
In 1996, then chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu formed a grouping of Left and regional parties and enlisted the support of Congress to install the United Front government under H D Deve Gowda and later I K Gujral. The UF government lasted only two years, followed by snap polls. Naidu went to the Lok Sabha polls in alliance with Left parties but soon found that BJP had made inroads in AP even while putting up a good show elsewhere in the country. BJP as a third force in AP politics alarmed him and he thought it to be a sane political strategy to prop up NDA government at the Centre to check further growth of BJP in the state.
Yet another snap poll saw the NDA retaining power, thanks to TDP’s spectacular performance in AP. The 36 seats won by TDP-BJP alliance helped Vajpayee to form the NDA-II and retain power till 2004. The revival of fortunes of the Congress in AP in 2004 polls ensured TDP’s defeat and brought a windfall of Lok Sabha seats for a post-poll alliance UPA to come to power. Despite a determined bid by TDP in AP and BJP in other states, the UPA retained power in 2009, with AP contributing 33 seats to the alliance.
Now, the situation in the state is hazy because of the emergence of a new party. The old players—Congress, TDP, Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) and BJP—are seeking to find ways to contend with this ‘new enemy’ who has altered the scene in Seemandhra and, to a limited extent, in Telangana region. Though Y S Jagan is in jail for over a year now, his party is causing jitters to all. There have been desertions from the Congress and TDP to YSRCP. The exodus has slowed down now but it may pick up if elections are round the corner.
YSRCP has repeatedly made it clear that it would not go with the NDA but would prefer to extend support to the UPA. After TDP’s successive debacle in 2004 and 2009, Chandrababu Naidu is also wary of aligning with BJP again. He is wooing back the Left parties. So far as TRS is concerned, it has no qualms about partnering with NDA in a post-poll scenario. Currently, both the TRS and BJP are daggers drawn at each other, claiming to be sole champions of Telangana statehood cause. But opportunism being their hallmark, they may court each other, post-poll, if the NDA is within striking distance of grabbing power. This is possible only if they get the numbers!
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