If CPM-Congress alliance is successful in Bengal, it will last till 2019 LS elections

When Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, the tallest CPM leader from West Bengal and Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi, shared a dais and even a gigantic garland that was put around them, many quipped that this was nothing more than circus. Park Circus maidan, the traditional ground where circus teams used to pitch their tent in winter, is also the ground where this ‘historic’ moment unfolded. Whether this was ‘historic’ moment or a ‘circus’, time will tell. One thing is clear. What is shaping up as the 2016 Battle for Bengal will have far-reaching consequences with regards to the parliamentary elections of 2019. [caption id=“attachment_2747742” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] The results of the West Bengal Assembly election will decide the fate of the CPM-Congress alliance. PTI[/caption] The Congress badly needs a veneer of ideology and direction after its pathetic performance in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. While for long, the Congress has run with the hare and hunted with hounds by being a right-winger to some of its constituents and a left-winger to others and maintained a so-called centrist big capital-friendly social-liberal consensus, much of the centre-right space in the Hindi states and in the big cities of the Indian Union has been captured by the BJP. The Congress thus has to rebrand itself differently, even if cynically, and that is to appear more pro-people than it actually is. This is where the closeness with the CPM is immensely helpful where just by association it can create an impression of a certain kind without making any serious changes in its political programme. If the CPM-Congress alliance is successful in Bengal, this alliance will probably go on till the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. And in this kind of politics, the ends do justify the means. The voices that are sarcastic at the spectacle of the CPM and Congress becoming political allies in a state like West Bengal where every neighbourhood and village is littered with martyrs memorials erected to remember the murder of the thousands of Congress activists killed by the CPM and vice-versa will find less currency if this alliance is able to dislodge the Trinamool from power in West Bengal in these Assembly elections. These elections of Bengal have the potential to decide what kind of forces will form the main group that will challenge BJP at the centre in 2019. If the CPM-Congress alliance wins, this will no doubt form the core of a India-wide secularist with a ‘human face’ kind of alliance. Congress and its electoral clout and the CPM with its ideological and networking clout will be the main pillars of this alliance. Once this is successful in Bengal, certain other forces from the Janata camp and a section of federal parties will join this alliance. This will present a national alternative to the policies of the BJP. At least, they will claim to be very different. This will be a UPA-I like situation, where Congress will primarily call the shots, some policy tweaking will happen to due to CPM presence and other allies will be kept in line by carrots of central grants and sticks of CBI. However, if the Trinamool wins, it will get busy in trying to bring pro-state rights parties together. It already made such an initiative during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections in its call for a federal front but in the midst of a Modi wave in the Hindi belt, it was essentially a non-starter. However, with the string of successes of pro-federalism parties like Janata Dal (United), Aam Aadmi Party and older parties like the Biju Janata Dal with which the Trinamool has taken coordinated positions in the past, this grouping will surely want to become the pole which will take on the BJP at the centre. Such a situation is no good news for the Congress which might have to play second fiddle to a pro-federalism alliance that will want to devolve power to the states and hence hitting the traditional source of the legitimacy of the Congress, that is, power at the centre. This will also make the Left marginal. The Congress and the CPM in such a case might have to offer some kind of support to the federal alliance, given their anti-BJP posturing. A federal front government at the centre has the potentially to fundamentally shake up how Delhi runs the Indian Union and might even see power moving to the states, stopping the bullying and black-mailing role that big ’national’ parties typically play.

The outcome of the Battle for Bengal will decide the shape of things to come in 2019. It looks like a state Assembly battle but its consequences are sure to be far-reaching. The BJP surely will be part of the politicking for they will try to strengthen whoever who has a lesser chance or ability defeat them. As it stood in 2014, the expansion of the BJP was arrested not in Congress bastions but in states where pro-federalism parties were in power. Historically, big business has been staunchly opposed to the possibility of any government where either the Congress or the BJP is not the major driver. Given the unprecedented corporate money muscle that was at display during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, one can imagine which way these invisible powers have lined up in the 2016 Battle for Bengal. By May 19, we will know whether its a green light for the formation of a federalist alliance or a Congress-CPM led alliance for leading the charge in 2019.