The opposition parties have once again failed to pose a strong challenge against the ruling coalition candidate in the forthcoming Presidential polls as it has failed to pick the appropriate candidate. Their first choice was seasoned politician Sharad Pawar, who declined the offer to be the opposition candidate. Farooq Abdullah, another veteran politician and former Chief Minister of the trouble-torn Jammu and Kashmir, also refused to accept the offer. Making matters worse for the opposition camp, Gopalkrishna Gandhi, great grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, a former Governor of West Bengal and a career diplomat, also turned down the offer. The opposition parties finally put up former Union Minister Yashwant Sinha as their candidate. Sinha is a less prominent candidate in comparison to heavyweight leaders like Pawar or Abdullah. The need of the hour was to choose a candidate, whose name would ensure the support of regional parties like Telangana Rashtriya Samiti (TRS) or Biju Janata Dal (BJD) apart from a few other parties, which were not part of the opposition alliance. As a result, the ruling coalition which has two per cent less votes than the requisite number of votes, is now comfortably placed as many regional parties have already extended their support to NDA’s candidate Droupadi Murmu, which will help the first tribal presidential candidate to wipe out the deficit quite easily.
By closely examining the developments of the last few days, it can be concluded that the opposition parties have actually bailed out the ruling alliance. They failed to bring all non-BJP parties under one umbrella to adequately challenge the ruling party candidate in getting the requisite 50 per cent first preference votes. The opposition camp has shown huge political immaturity, while picking the candidate as it is now clear from the refusal of both Farooq Abdullah and Gopalkrishna Gandhi that their names were considered without taking them into confidence. It would have been better if the opposition had picked someone apolitical but famous enough to inspire the nation like former President APJ Abdul Kalam as its candidate. In such a scenario, it would have been easier for the opposition parties to get the support of those parties which did not join the opposition alliance, a situation which could have forced the ruling coalition to a consensus. But in their own wisdom, the opposition leaders decided to ignore reality and went ahead with a script that was unsuited for the current political situation of the country. The Shiv Sena has rightly questioned who the opposition parties would project as the face against Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2024, if they couldn’t pick a suitable candidate for the Presidential polls? The opposition parties should find an answer to this question at the earliest for their own survival.