Modi destroys opposition unity move

Bhubaneswar, July 19(Reporters Today Bureau): By fielding Droupadi Murmu as the NDA nominee for the presidential election, Prime Minister Narendra Modi virtually demolished any chance of an opposition alliance in the country—mainly the group of Modi haters. It was not by design but by the chance offered to the BJP on a platter by the opposition parties led by West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress Chief Mamata Banerjee ahead of the Presidential election. It was the decision of the opposition to oppose the candidature of Murmu that has spelled doom for the effort to forge unity among the opposition groups.

It has already been seen in the country that one decision of a particular political party has had far reaching implications. One decision of Indira Gandhi to impose Emergency rule in the country in 1975 spontaneously brought the entire opposition parties together to fight the alleged ‘dictatorship’ of the Iron Lady of Indian politics. On the contrast the move of the NDA to field Murmu has virtually demolished the opposition move to come together. Some critics say that it would have been better for Mamata Banerjee to have waited for an opportune moment and take any decision on fielding the former Union Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha—the fourth choice after Sharad Pawar, Farooq Abdullah, Gopal Krishna Gandhi– as its choice. According to them this decision of Banerjee has indirectly hit the efforts towards forging an alliance among the opposition parties to stall the Modi juggernaut very hard.

At the end what has happed is that the 18 party combine has finally has been reduced to about five parties, including TMC, NCP, Congress and Samajwadi party. The other parties that were the proposers of Sinha gradually backed out from supporting Sinha and chose Murmu. There political compulsions notwithstanding what is glaring is that an opposition unity is virtually impossible in the country as the leaders of every single party either work according to his agenda or is not inclined to accept the other as the group’s leader.

Though in the past, especially ahead of any Assembly or Lok Sabha election, such efforts have been made which has never worked. The TRS in Telengana, TMC in West Bengal, Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh, NCP in Maharashtra, TDP in Andhra Pradesh and Congress are unlikely to ever support each other when the question of Prime Minister comes to the discussion table. Even if an alliance is forged by some means, any sensible analyst can vouch that such a formation is unlikely to continue. Discussing them at length is a wastage of time.

Coming to candidature of Murmu, the so called opposition unity and the hectic political activity that followed in the opposition camp after the candidature of ‘Pride of Odisha’ was announced, fizzled out as soon as it had been formed. And the unconditional support of ruling BJD in Odisha dealt the deathblow on the move of Banerjee. It need not be mentioned here that the support for Murmu grew in strength thereafter and by the election was held the impact was visible. It is really interesting to note that even MPs and MLAs from Congress, Nationalist Congress Party, Shiv Sena supported Murmu in her race for the Raisina Hill.

Murmu’s election had become near certain the day she filed her nomination and with that the opposition unity move had fizzled out.