INDIA Bloc Splits, Congress Goes Solo. Advantage BJP in Rajasthan Bypolls?

The 13 November bypolls for seven Assembly seats are a litmus test for all major parties in . With the INDIA bloc cracking up in the desert state just five months after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, its constituent parties are contesting the bypolls separately. As the Congress goes solo and the alliance seems in disarray, the opposition has failed to present a cohesive front against the ruling BJP which faces public scrutiny nearly 11 months after it regained power in Rajasthan.

For the Congress, the stakes in the Rajasthan bypolls are high, as it currently holds four of the seven seats – Chorasi, Dausa, Deoli-Uniara, Jhunjunu, Khinwsar, Ramgarh and Salumber – slated to vote. Its INDIA bloc allies – the Bharatiya Adivasi Party (BAP) and Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP) – hold one seat each, as does the ruling BJP. Unlike in Uttar Pradesh, where it has refrained from fielding candidates against the Samajwadi Party, in Rajasthan, the Congress has nominated candidates for all seven seats.

The Congress strategy now is in striking contrast to the Lok Sabha elections. When fighting together, the INDIA bloc had snatched 11 seats from the NDA which had swept all 25 (the BJP won 24 in 2019) in Rajasthan during the 2014 and 2019 polls. In the Lok Sabha battle, the Congress had tied up with the RLP, the CPM and the BAP. Congress leaders and their coalition partners campaigned vigorously for each other and the strategy succeeded handsomely – the ruling BJP suffered a major jolt just four months after regaining power in Rajasthan.

Strangely, the Congress party has chosen to go solo in the bypolls. While neither the BAP nor the RLP has fielded candidates in the four sitting seats of the Congress, the grand old party has fielded candidates in Chorasi where the BAP won and in Khinwsar where the RLP won in the last Assembly elections. With the alliance collapsing, the BAP has fielded a candidate even in Salumbar, which is a BJP sitting seat where the Congress had come second last time, as the parties failed to even open a dialogue between them.

Despite being the fulcrum of the INDIA bloc, political circles are buzzing that the Congress took no initiative to discuss possible alliances with the BAP and the RLP - and the smaller parties too did not reach out to the alliance leader. Besides turning a straight fight against the BJP into tricky, triangular contests, especially in Nagaur and Chorasi, the optics and vote calculus of the bypoll battle have been spoilt by the INDIA bloc's split.

To gauge the impact on poll prospects of the Congress and its allies, it’s worth examining the broad details on a few seats. For instance, in Khinwsar, where Hanuman Beniwal resigned after winning the Nagaur Lok Sabha seat, the RLP chief had won the last assembly polls by a narrow margin of 2,059 votes over the BJP while the Congress came third but had polled 27,763 votes.

This time, Beniwal wanted the Congress to continue the Lok Sabha alliance and ensure a victory for the RLP but as the Congress fielded Ratan Chaudhary from the seat, he has put up his wife Kanika; and an election which the Congress-RLP alliance could have won easily, has now become a fierce, unpredictable clash.

Similarly, in the Chorasi seat where the BAP’s Rajkumar Roat resigned after his Lok Sabha victory, the BAP leader had polled 53.92 per cent votes in the 2023 elections. In contrast, the BJP and Congress received 20.37 per cent and 13.64 per cent votes respectively. But now, with the Congress fielding Mahesh Roat as its candidate, the easy win that a Congress-BAP tie-up could have ensured, has become a tough, triangular battle.   

The damage to Congress-INDIA bloc prospects can be seen most vividly in the BJP-held seat of Salumber. In 2023, the BJP won with 37.54 per cent votes while the Congress polled 30.66 per cent votes and the BAP bagged 24.23 per cent votes. But with the alliance cracking, the BAP has fielded its own candidate. Inevitably, an easy win that a combined Congress-BAP candidate could have achieved has become impossible and the BJP seems to gain.

Political observers say the split in INDIA bloc reflects that the Congress has forgotten the lessons of the Assembly elections last year where the latter contested without any alliance, a decision that many believe contributed greatly to the BJP regaining power in Rajasthan. Despite parleys, the Congress had ignored tie-ups with potential allies in the 2023 Assembly polls and was defeated. It was only by stitching alliances with the BAP, the RLP and the Left parties that the Congress and the INDIA bloc could win 11 seats in the Lok Sabha polls.

Besides alliance woes, infighting and factionalism in the Congress persists. The Gehlot-Pilot rift rages on and though the two rivals were despatched to Maharashtra to prevent fissures from spilling out, the lack of cohesion between differing camps in the state unit is glaring. Currently, the task of leading the campaign for the bypolls has been left to state party chief Govind Dotasra. But the absence of the stalwarts has created a strong perception that the Congress party is hardly serious about winning the bypoll battle.

In many ways, the Rajasthan situation mirrors the Congress struggles in Haryana where it . The Haryana defeat highlighted several areas where the Congress needs to improve: resolving party factionalism, strengthening alliance coordination and presenting a cohesive message. Yet these lessons seem unheeded and even the Haryana setback has not pushed it to either set its own house in order or to be more responsive to Allies. This failure not only weakens the Congress’s standing but also erodes voter confidence in the INDIA bloc.

In contrast to the Congress, the stakes are not too high for BJP as it holds only one of the seven seats going for bypolls. Even if it retains its one sitting seat of Salumber, the BJP can hold its head high. But riding on the division in the INDIA bloc, the BJP hopes to increase its tally by snatching a few seats which will be a big boost to the ruling party. Even if it wins one extra seat, the BJP could cite it as vindication of its governance.

Moreover, the bypolls hold vital importance for Chief Minister Bhajan Lal’s leadership. Given a lacklustre performance by his government in the past 11 months and the Lok Sabha setback, political pundits say Bhajan may be in trouble if the BJP fares poorly. And with former CM Vasundhara Raje waiting in the wings, more than the party, lots may be riding for Bhajan as critics of the debutant MLA-turned-CM are ready to pounce on his failures!

In a nutshell, though the Rajasthan bypolls may have no bearing on the survival or continuance of the BJP government, they could exert a major impact on political optics and the future of individual leaders in the desert state. While many in the BJP and the Congress are resentful about the chosen candidates and the promotion of dynastic politics, the lack of coordination among INDIA bloc partners could be a decisive factor that may give the edge to the saffron brigade. 

(The author is a veteran journalist and expert on Rajasthan politics. Besides serving as a Resident Editor at NDTV, he has been a Professor of Journalism at the University of Rajasthan in Jaipur. He tweets at @rajanmahan. This is an opinion article and the views expressed are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)