Alliance

Trying to spin up some froth – putting in the name of PA Sangma as the Presidential candidate

Politics is a very strange game. Just a couple of months back, there was a lot of debate over the political weakness of the UPA Government, and how the Congress is being tormented by its allies. It was unable to pass any major reform due to opposition from some of its allies, and the biggest problem was likely to be that of getting its candidate elected for the President of India. This was compounded by the meetings (usually of some law which the center needed to pass) where the state Chief Ministers used to be present, and most of them would be opposing some law or the other, presenting a united front that seems to portray that power is passing to the states. Now, some of that still remains true, and the allies of the Congress still needle the Congress over issues and over the various laws that the Congress wants to pass. The major reform bills that the Congress would want to pass to portray that there is no paralysis are all in limbo, unable to get clearance from allies, and the Congress does not seem to have the political will or strength to get the allies in line.
However, one major exception to this is the election for President. The Congress sees this as a major point in the political arena and has done all the negotiation with its allies to get the support. The Congress does not have the necessary strength to get the President elected on the basis of their own strength, and needed the support of its allies. And it looks like enough negotiation has gone on to get the required support, with the selection of candidates who are not likely to cause offense to anyone and make it easier to get support from allies and others. And of course, except for Mamta Banerjee, everybody of the others have given the Congress enough ammunition to get pressure piled on them, with the CBI having cases against every leader of the political spectrum (mostly on the basis of disproportionate assets or some kind of scams).
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The BJP’s failure to capitalize on the problems of the Congress, will it ever be seen as an alternative ?

Consider the fact that the Government is seen as gripped by policy paralysis, there is a reduction in the growth rate of the economy, and the Congress has been steadily losing state elections, and even seen in a problematic position in municipal elections in major cities in states ruled by the Congress. One would have expected that this would be the time that a resurgent opposition party would be able to capitalize on these issues, project itself as the national alternative, and start to attract the un-attached regional parties that cannot go with the Congress. In short, this would have been the time for the BJP to be seen as a huge alternative, ready to menace the support alliance of the Congress, and would have seen the NDA emerge as a massive alternative to the UPA.
But consider what is happening ? The BJP remains in the throes of a crisis. The only saving grace for the BJP in a huge electoral state such as Uttar Pradesh is that the Congress has got fewer seats than the BJP, but otherwise it is nowhere in the large scheme of things. The BJP is unable to make inroads in states where it does not have much of a support base, and the one state where it could have reached out into new territory is showcasing the worst performance of the BJP as a political entity (talking about Karnataka where Yeddyurappa keeps on threatening the BJP central leadership and the current Chief Minister in the state, and the Supreme Court keeps on threatening Yeddyurappa with more cases). By now, the BJP has become a laughing stock in the state and the corruption allegations against Yeddyurappa keeps on rising whenever it makes a national stand against corruption, and probably the only thing that is in its favor is that the rival parties are equally factional ridden.
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Getting to a coherent policy on Telangana – Congress in a bind

For a quick update on why the Congress is worried about the current Telangana issue, there are 2 quick points that would help readers understand why the current agitation of Telangana is so disturbing for the party and yet it is unable to do anything about it.
- Andhra Pradesh is strategically very important for the Congress. It gave the largest contingent of Congress MP’s in the last Lok Sabha elections of 2009 (the Congress won 33 seats from the state), and hence provides some amount of stability for the Congress.
- The Congress had a major leader in the form of the YSR who was the unquestioned leader of the party in the state, and led the party to wins in both the assembly and the Lok Sabha elections.
As a result, the scene in Andhra Pradesh is very important for the Congress, and something that the state should be strongly focusing on. But the reality is something very different. The twin blows of the Telangana agitation and the fight by Jaganmohan Reddy threaten the Congress position in the entire state, and the Congress seems to be totally at sea in terms of how to deal with these situations.
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