Opinion Akhilesh Yadav playing role of mediator for Opposition unity: As of now, anti-Modi formation is all noise and no substance
The minimum requirement is to negotiate a strategy for how to win constituency by constituency in the 2024 elections

The newest lobbyist for opposition unity to pop up on the Indian scene is Akhilesh Yadav. He met Trinamool Congress founder and leader Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata to try and work out how two ambitious alliance-makers could join forces for what would be a partnership of non-Bharatiya Janata Party and non-Congress small and regional parties.
Having trekked through Bihar, where Yadav met Nitish Kumar of the Janata Dal (United) and the Rashtriya Janata Dal family, it looks as though the Samajwadi Party is moving into a political space that is obviously vacant — the honest broker.
This role was once played by astute statesmen Harkishen Singh Surjeet, Jyoti Basu, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Sharad Pawar. Akhilesh Yadav taking on this task is him following in his father’s footsteps. These elder statesmen firmly believed that with the decline of the Congress that began after the historic defeat of Indira Gandhi in the 1977 Lok Sabha election, the era of alliances had begun. They argued that the responsibility of representing the diversity of voters’ aspirations and ideas could not be monopolised by any one party, regardless of how large or organised it is.
While Akhilesh Yadav is new to the role of mediator, the need for more than one mediator is necessary if a unified opposition is determined to fight to defeat the entrenched BJP. The multiplicity of initiatives to give leadership to opposition unity building increases the probability of failure rather than the possibility of shaping a coherent challenge to the Modi regime. Aam Aadmi Party, the Trinamool Congress and the Bharat (earlier Telangana) Rashtra Samithi are all vying for the same role.
Unifying the opposition into a viable alliance ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections could be a pipe dream, unless there are leaders willing to serve a larger cause — which is, to bring together principal potential allies, who may as of now be working at cross purposes. With four opposition unity groups working for the same end, there is room for a group of mediators.
The anti-Modi opposition, distributed into four camps, has tied itself into knots because the fight, as of now, is a waste. The opposition does not have the luxury of time. The 2024 Lok Sabha election is just about 12 months away.
In an imaginary landscape, it is possible to believe, as do Mamata Banerjee, Arvind Kejriwal and even the two Communist Parties, albeit with some variations, that each party should leverage its local strength to fight the BJP. These wins, in the imaginary universe, would yield sufficient seats to unseat Modi and defeat the BJP. This is nonsense.
The reality is that there are six state assembly elections due between now and December. In most of these states, potential allies of the bigger fight in 2024 will transform themselves into arch-rivals and engage in ferocious fights. These fights may well result in the attrition of the commitment and discipline required to build partnerships for the 2024 election battle. Aam Aadmi Party has already begun positioning itself to take on the Congress and the BJP in Rajasthan. The Congress will be engaged in a war with regional parties in Telangana.
A regional ruling party may not be equally certain of winning the maximum seats in the state in the 2024 elections. It is entirely likely that potential allies will fight each other to the death and create space for the BJP to win a large number of seats. In the recently concluded state assembly elections in Tripura, the Congress and the CPI (M) were partners; the newly hatched TIPRA Motha fought independently, but helped the BJP win the bare majority of 33 seats out of 60 by splitting the opposition vote. In Goa, AAP and the Trinamool Congress split the anti-BJP vote and bled the Congress. In Gujarat, AAP ate into mostly Congress votes and helped the BJP retain power. The list of such self-defeating exercises by the anti-Modi opposition can be stretched, if an analysis is done constituency by constituency.
The party that best recognises why allies matter is the BJP. The necessity of building partnerships with regional and smaller parties — especially micro caste-based parties that represent communities that have emerged — to claim a share of power that coalitions offer as access to opportunity, in advance, is clearly understood by the BJP. Especially in large states like Uttar Pradesh and in the North East, where a different kind of identity politics is the norm.
The opposition has very little choice on what its strategy should be, because the BJP has already laid out the board with its pieces well-placed. It has laboured over how specific parties, no matter how small, can increase its chances of winning. Additionally, the BJP is working to keep potential allies divided.
For the anti-Modi opposition to take on the challenge of the BJP, the minimum requirement is to negotiate a strategy for how to win constituency by constituency in the 2024 elections. The era of post-election alliances arrived at through interminable consultations with honest brokers working overtime is over. Maharashtra’s recent politics is the best instance of how wheeling and dealing works, even if it rearranges the order of things as mandated in the Constitution.
There is a unified core of opposition to the Narendra Modi BJP secreted within at least four separate and independent initiatives. The regulars at more than one of these unified opposition meetings, mostly to decide on floor strategy for turbulent Parliament sessions, are the two Communist Parties, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, and lately the Janata Dal (United), the Janata Dal (Secular), the Nationalist Congress Party and the DMK.
The Congress and its long-term allies seem to have a stable but not effective winning combination. It is, therefore, up to Congress and its allies to work out how to add partners instead of antagonising them. A reflection of how potential allies perceive Congress is evident in the theory that Congress should gracefully decline the job of leading an anti-Modi formation. Instead, it should play second fiddle to a smaller party with a charismatic leader, who can be the “face” of the formation.
Akhilesh Yadav may not have the heft as yet to mediate with the contentious parties within the opposition space. There are other parties and leaders who could work together to put an allied offensive in place. Whether that exercise would succeed or fall apart is a risk that the opposition may choose to take, if it thinks it can challenge the BJP. Till it does so, the current exercises are all noise and no substance.
(The writer is a Kolkata-based journalist)