A CMP between Congress and BJP

The tectonic shift represents a deeper malaise in our polity. The political paradigm has changed, and not for the better. The prime minister, who played by the rules of the day, has been outmanoeuvred because the day has changed.

The fact that survival depends on all of these disparate interests pulling together means that policymaking is a dash from crisis to crisis. No coalition can function if allies constantly threaten to pull down the government. Legitimate reminders about collective cabinet responsibility carry less weight in a weak, fragmented, dysfunctional coalition. Unfortunately, the institutional dynamics are self-reinforcing: the success of smaller parties in driving national agendas that affect constituencies far beyond those that elected them only encourages the emergence of more small parties.

We are at a critical point in this spiral toward political entropy. The renewed activity in the UNPA, the so-called ‘third front’, in the last one week can be seen as a signal of expectations: if it is to be an electoral alliance, it means that the participants must assume that the two mainstream parties taken together will garner less than 50 per cent of the seats in the Lok Sabha. This is the only way that the arithmetic for the third front would justify the formation of the entity. This would be the ultimate demonstration example to accelerate fragmentation.

The broader question is: how does one prevent the hijacking of the national agenda by smaller parties?

The national interest can only be served if the two mainstream parties acknowledge and strengthen common ground on issues of national concern. Governments in power usually blame opposition parties for not cooperating adequately, often even when cooperation is the necessity. The NDA complained about the opposition Congress party when it was in office, even though it did secure their cooperation ultimately in areas like electricity, insurance and several legislations to strengthen the financial sector. Under the old rules of the game, it seemed a useful device for shifting attention and a way to shore up internal solidarity by creating an opposition — an enemy.

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