Two names - two satraps, two stalwarts - in Indian politics have dominated the political discourse since the evening of June 4: Chandrababu Naidu of Andhra Pradesh and Nitish Kumar of Bihar. Both are seniors to Modi. Their parties, however, have been junior partners of the NDA bloc. But, they can’t be run roughshod over any more. The coalition for Modi’s third term as PM now totally depends on the magnanimity of Naidu and Nitish.
A joke doing the rounds in New Delhi these days is that the NDA is now the Naidu Dependent Alliance and the Nitish Dependent Alliance.
Any coalition is fragile. But in India, the experience is varied - they have nipped midway and have also survived. All governments, from 1989 onwards till 2014, were coalition arrangements. Former prime ministers Narsimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh kept them afloat for successful 5-year terms. But the combination of Modi and Amit Shah is believed to be less than equipped to withstand such a challenge. They are pragmatic, but not malleable enough. Both have come from non-coalition political backgrounds and have wielded uncompromised power.
In fact, the Modi-Shah duo has been infamous for breaking coalition governments and nine such non-BJP dispensations crumbled during their time at the helm, and they were stitched together to stall a BJP-chosen or BJP-backed leader as chief minister. Their most notable work was splitting the Shiv Sena of Bal Thackeray and Nationalist Congress Party of Sharad Pawar. These shenanigans were exercised with the use of guile and threats of all hues.
Striking a conciliatory tone, Modi said consensus will be the hallmark of the NDA and described it as the “most successful alliance in India’s history.”
But both Modi and Shah have mellowed as alliance talks got underway and Modi was elected to lead the next government as PM. He only took Congress to task, and since both Naidu and Nitish are supported by Muslim voters, his post-result speech did a reversal of his poll-time vitriol: “Our path is sarv panth sambhav (respect for all religions)...in Goa or the North-East, where our Christian brothers and sisters are in large numbers, we have our governments.”
Even the banner in the background of the podium had texted printed in Urdu apart from many other languages, saying Shukriya Bharat (Thank you, India).
Striking a conciliatory tone, Modi said consensus will be the hallmark of the NDA and described it as the “most successful alliance in India’s history.”
Will it move India, and BJP’s alliance partners? Coalition governments tend to generate a degree of confrontation. Even deliberation on sharing power is no less complex than a business negotiation. Both Naidu and Nitish have spelt out their list of demands: both have objected to Agniveer, a contract basis recruitment for army, both want a larger share for state allocation, Naidu has made it clear that his state would continue selected reservation for Muslims in state jobs, and above it all, if the political grapevine is to be believed, they and other allies have an objection to Amit Shah holding the portfolio of Home Minister.
Meanwhile, in another ominous news, some breakaway legislators of NCP have reportedly expressed desire to their parent party. Similarly, Congress has won back four legislative seats that it had lost due to the defection of its legislators in the hilly state of Himachal Pradesh.
This has led to pundits predicting the demise of the Modi government and mid-term polls. “A snap poll is certain, though I am not sure when it will happen. It might take a year or two, but it will happen. It also seems certain that Modi will not lead the BJP in the next election,” said veteran-journalist Ramsharan Joshi, who has been covering Indian elections since 1967.
Joshi feels that NDA allies would extract their pound of flesh, which will have an impact not just in terms of policymaking, but also in terms of the composition of the cabinet.
Till the time of writing this piece, the political commentariat in New Delhi was guessing how coalition partners would strike deals with the BJP. One guess was that the TDP, with maximum 16 seats among partners, was seeking the post of parliamentary Speaker, apart from some plump cabinet berths.
The Modi government will have to patch up policy defects of its economic roadmap, or the failure on this road will lead to a hasty mishap of the government.
The move, according to guessers, will guarantee that in case the party decides to part ways with the Modi government, its parliamentarians will escape disciplinary action and disqualification under the anti-defection law that is applied as per discretion of the Speaker.
The BJP will very unlikely concede the Speaker’s slot and devise other ways to mollify and maneuver allies. This is the test that will be the most challenging for the Modi 3.0 and as time shall pass, the political seasons will undergo different weather, managing a coalition will prove more cumbersome.
Economy: patch up or pack up
Modi’s BJP has floundered in rural areas. In urban areas, it has maintained its preeminence. New Delhi is the example where the party won all 7 seats despite the Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) tie-up.
Does it mean that the party’s welfare schemes like free ration failed and the inflation-ridden, yet vibrant market-oriented economy kept the middle-class clung to the party? It definitely sounds so. However, analysts have alerted intense alarms for Modi’s third term in power.
The New York Times, in a detailed post-mortem of post-election challenges to PM Modi said that he would have to generate millions of jobs to placate the youth that are reeling under growing unemployment.
Food inflation of above 8% since November 2023 has hit the poor hard. Prices of vegetables and cereals have risen by double digits for most of the last year, and they have continued to be so all through 2024.
Though its working-age population numbers roughly one billion, India has only 430 million jobs, according to the Center for Monitoring Indian Economy, an independent research institution in Mumbai. And most of those counted as employed are stuck in precarious circumstances as day laborers and farm hands, lacking reliable wages and government workplace protections.
“There has been a sense that employment growth has been weak in the last four, five years,” said Arvind Subramanian, former economic advisor to Modi, told the NYT, “How do you create more jobs? This is really India’s central economic challenge, but I think the government will find itself with relatively limited tools.”
Food inflation of above 8% since November 2023 has hit the poor hard. Prices of vegetables and cereals have risen by double digits for most of the last year, and they have continued to be so all through 2024. Only a day after the announcement of the result, the government announced a hike of Rs 2 on half-liter milk packets.
It will likely make the government more unpopular in rural India.
The Modi government has earned laurels for building a number of airports and ports. It has also built the world's largest network of highways to smoothen inter-state transport to boost trade. Similarly, manufacturing and exports too have surged substantially, but not enough to produce as many jobs as the middle-class is sending youths into the market.
The NYT says that the situation will put the Modi government in a quandary. “With no clear pathway toward economic dynamism and more challenging political circumstances, Mr. Modi might resort to a time-honored method of shoring up support: he will expand social welfare programs, tapping government coffers to hand out more cash to communities in need. Such a course could potentially diminish available funding for the advancement of the government’s signature program — its aggressive construction of highways, ports, airports and other infrastructure,” the NYT summed up.
The Modi government will have to patch up policy defects of its economic roadmap, or the failure on this road will lead to a hasty mishap of the government.
Wrangling within the BJP
Stories of resentment and infighting within the BJP over the takeover of the party by the Modi-Shah duo keep emerging from time to time. The mega populism of Modi and authoritative style of handling the party, coupled with the administrative style of Amit Shah are said to have built a block within BJP that will see their exit at the earliest opportunity.
There has been genuine dissent within the party over fielding turncoats from other parties in the election in place of incumbent parliamentarians.
Some BJP observers say that the Sangh Parivar (RSS) also feels that the party is suffering as a result of Modi-Shah occupying the driving seat. The RSS is particularly peeved with leaders like Nitin Gadkari, Rajnath Singh, who are favorites of the Sangh Parivar, being pushed to the back row.
There are reports that UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath, a protégée of Rajnath Singh, both being Rajput leaders, ensured that the party loses on certain seats. However, such reports may be part of an avalanche of post-election analyses that are doing the rounds.
But there has been genuine dissent within the party over fielding turncoats from other parties in the election in place of incumbent parliamentarians.
The party roughly dropped one fourth of sitting Members of Parliament (MPs) for leaders who switched over from other parties just before the election. A number of them have lost.
Throughout the election campaign, Rajput leaders of the party were up in arms against Brahmins or backward caste leadership. Sometimes, brawls broke out in poll rallies and as a result, Rajput leaders have lost where Brahmins deserted the party as in Ayodhya, and Brahmins have lost in areas where Rajputs decided to stay away from party as in Chandauli in UP and in several seats Rajasthan.
Meanwhile, bickering has started in several state units of the party.
Observers say that under the leadership of Modi and Shah, the party became centralized and state leaders would have to come to Delhi to get their proposals green-lighted and many a time, they were merely handed instructions to follow.
Everything will fall in line once Modi will be PM with a swollen majority used to be a common refrain, say observers. And now when that hasn’t happened, the dissent within the party will have to be doused before it devours it from within any further.
India will this year see assembly polls in states like Jammu and Kashmir, Haryana, Maharashtra and Jharkhand. Then early next year, Bihar will go to polls. All these states are critical to the survival of the Modi government. If the BJP, under Modi’s uncertain leadership remains in disarray, it will soon lose favor at the polling booths.