The recent status revision of various political parties by the Election Commission (EC) has revealed interesting facts about the present state of Indian politics. Only six parties have been able to acquire the status of national party after fulfilling some stiff criterions, while several parties such as All India Trinamool Congress (AITC), Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and Communist Party of India (CPI) among others have lost their recognition as national parties. The rise of both Aam Admi Party (AAP) and National People’s Party as national parties throws no surprise as the two parties have made impressive progress in the last few years. The real surprise is that despite poor electoral performances in the recent past, Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has still managed to retain its place in the national list which is indicative that the issue of social justice has not lost its relevance in Indian politics.
Among the parties included in the national list, AAP is now in power in Delhi and Punjab apart from making its presence felt in both Gujarat and Goa. On the other hand, NPP is leading the coalition government in Meghalaya and enjoys popular support in a number of Northeastern states. It is clear that, getting the national party status may help these parties in a big way as until further revision of status, both AAP and NPP have exclusive rights to their election symbols, which means that the party candidates will be able to contest nationwide elections with a particular symbol. But parties like Mamata Banerjee’s All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) or Sharad Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) will be devoid of such an advantage. The demotion is a severe blow to their desire to set up candidates in multiple states as candidates of these parties can fight elections with their own party symbol only in the states where they are recognised political parties. So, if a leader of Mamata Banerjee’s party decides to fight elections from any state apart from west Bengal, he or she will have to do it with a different symbol.
This could potentially be a significant roadblock to any plans of opposition unity. It appears that the bargaining power of regional parties like AITC or NCP will vastly reduce and they may have to give up any hopes of leading the opposition alliance due to lack of adequate numbers to substantiate claims. They are further handicapped by the fact that any effort by these regional political parties to regain lost popularity may be detrimental for opposition unity. For example, Sharad Pawar’s decision to contest in the forthcoming Karnataka Assembly elections to prove his party’s presence beyond the borders of Maharashtra has not been taken kindly by the Congress, which sees the move as being counterproductive to opposition unity. But the most important message in the recent exercise is that finding a suitable face to challenge Narendra Modi will become harder as almost all regional satraps have failed to make the national cut.