HANGING BY A THREAD

 

 

A N INTRIGUING part of democracy has played out in M a h a r a s h t r a Assembly elections where strange political alliances fought with each other with their own equations but with a dark cloak of insecurity surrounding their future. Never had the elections in the State been so unpredictable that even seasoned pollsters are afraid of making a prediction. A hung Assembly looks a possible outcome after November 23 and with it the existence of some outfits and alliances, too, looks hanging by a thread. The high-octane election campaign brought out all the insecurities prevailing among the six contesting parties and with them the deepening fault-lines in the State’s polity over caste and creed. A vicious division along religious and caste lines was the disturbing trend of this year’s Assembly elections. The Marathwada region witnessed the worst of this affliction with people of a particular caste shunning relations with the other caste demanding reservation.

 

The OBC-Maratha divide has gone to the extent of blacklisting shops of one community selling agricultural equipment and fertilisers in a milieu full of farmers. The social fabric of the region has been torn asunder and the ripple effects are bound to resonate in other parts of the State. It is a matter of deep introspection for Maharashtra which once boasted of being progressive and also for the political parties prioritising only shortterm gains. After November 23 results, the shrill rhetoric over caste and reservations might subside and a clear picture might emerge following legal clarity over the issue. But the political picture is set to become hazier as the temporary alliances might go for a reset after a reality check. The show of shifting loyalties, perfectly termed by experts as the‘gig’ phenomenon, is poised to continue for a while after the results.

 

Except the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress, the other four outfits – NCP (Sharad Pawar), NCP (Ajit Pawar), Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde), Shiv Sena (Uddhav Thackeray) – might be pushed to an existential crisis. Caught in an internal battle despite the same ideologies, both the NCP and Shiv Sena had been relegated to junior partners in the alliances. There is growing discontent in the cadre and the number of fence-sitters is swelling by the day. If the results do not go the way the senior alliance partners have planned, there is a strong likelihood of formation of new political equations. The last few years have seen politicians opting for short-term vision over long-term ideological commitments. The pact of Shiv Sena with Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) to form the Maha Vikas Aaghadi (MVA) started the trend of deserting ideological partners and choosing political foes to gain power. It fuelled a rebellion which led to split in Sena with Eknath Shinde taking out a faction of 39 MLAs.

 

The second split came in a few years in the NCP when Ajit Pawar walked out with a breakaway group and also took the party name and symbol. The nephew was disillusioned by uncle Sharad Pawar’s constantly changing tactics with no clarity on his own political future. Both Shinde and Ajit Pawar became part of the Government engineered by the BJP and continue to ride the alliance. However, after the Lok Sabha elections there is a growing insecurity among the two allies as the BJP continues to pull strings. What was dubbed as a strategic power play with just a veneer of ideology is now looking fragile in both the MahaYuti and the MVA. The seat-sharing process caused sharp divisions in the MVA as Pawar Sr and Congress kept Thackeray on tenterhooks over the future course.

 

The number of seats allocated to each party also underlined the faith (or lack of it!) in each other’s winning chances. It resulted in a massive rebellion as the MVA partners grappled with the threat of Independents crowding the election space. The underlining factor in the MVA’s election strategy was distrust with each other. It is primed for an explosion after the results. The MahaYuti, too, was not untouched by rebellions.Though most of the rebels were silenced after hectic parleys, it looks like a temporary truce. The idea of conceding own political turf to alliance partners has not gone down well within the parties and if the results do not pan out as per expectations there will be growing calls for ouster and walkouts among the allies. Undercurrents were available during the campaign where Ajit Pawar chose to publicly differ with the BJP line of rallying Hindu voters.

 

He was also soft on the Sharad Pawar faction, raising speculation of a reconciliation. Among the MahaYuti partners, NCP is, perhaps, full of fence-sitters and Ajit Pawar’s gestures are being seen as a clue of his further political course. The Shinde group is also wary of its future as it is pitted directly against the UBT faction in most of the contests. It is a battle of survival for the Maharashtra Chief Minister. It will be interesting to see if he stays on his own independent course with his deft tactics and tag along the BJP or finds a ‘merger’ route with a like-minded partner. In an election dominated by insecurities and unpredictability, making a prediction of the political scene after the results is a tricky challenge. But the fact remains that the temporary alliances are set for a revamp.

 

A lot of water has flown under the bridge since the cobbling up of these coalitions. The Lok Sabha election came as the first signal for each partner and now the close fight for the State legislature has further altered their thinking.The future decision will be driven by ideological pulls, anxieties of constantly looking over one’s shoulder and compulsion of existence.