Senior Congress leader P. Chidambaram on Thursday questioned the future of the INDIA bloc, saying he was not sure if the opposition alliance is still intact. Chidambaram was speaking at the launch of Contesting Democratic Deficit, a book by Salman Khurshid and Mritunjay Singh Yadav.
Chidambaram said the condition of the alliance appeared uncertain. “The future (of INDIA bloc) is not so bright, as Mritunjay Singh Yadav said. He seems to feel that the alliance is still intact, but I am not sure. It is only Salman (Khurshid) who can answer because he was part of the negotiating team for the INDIA bloc. If the alliance is totally intact, I will be very happy. But it seems that it is frayed,” he said.
The Rajya Sabha MP also said that there was still a chance to bring the alliance together. “It can still be put together, there’s still time,” he added.
Referring to the ruling party, Chidambaram said the INDIA bloc was facing a strong organisational structure and needed to respond accordingly. “In my experience and my reading of history, there has been no political party so formidably organised as the BJP. It’s not just another political party. It’s a machine behind a machine and the two machines control all the machineries in India.
“From the Election Commission to the lowest police station in the country, they (BJP) are able to control and sometimes capture these institutions. It is a formidable machinery, as much as can be allowed in a democracy,” he said.
The book by Khurshid and Yadav reflects on efforts to revive the Congress ahead of the last Lok Sabha elections, including the Bharat Jodo Yatra and the formation of the INDIA bloc that brought together different political groups. It highlights how opposition parties came together “to defend the idea of an inclusive, pluralistic India”.
Chidambaram also said elections in India could be influenced to some extent, but not completely manipulated. “You can interfere with elections in India. You can tinker with them. But you can’t get away with elections. You can’t have elections where the ruling party gets away with 98 per cent of the votes… That is not possible in India,” he said.
He also spoke about the importance of the next general elections. “The 2029 elections are critical and must return us to a full-fledged democracy. If the 2029 general elections take a decisive turn to strengthen the BJP, we are beyond repair,” Chidambaram said.
Agreeing with Chidambaram, Khurshid said the INDIA bloc needed to address internal issues. “We need to address the concerns. The takeaway from Chidambaram’s views is that we have to be prepared for a very major battle in 2029. We have to deal with the whole idea of how to get the alliance partners together,” he said.
Meanwhile, the BJP also responded to Chidambaram’s statement saying that successive defeats have left the Congress scarred. “P Chidambaram used the word “formidable” six times to describe the BJP and its election machinery in a speech that lasted less than three minutes. The successive defeats have left the Congress scarred, much like Pakistan after its bases were destroyed by the Indian Air Force,” BJP’s Amit Malviya said in a post on X.
Moreover, BJP leader Shehzad Poonawalla called the INDIA bloc a “tukde-tukde alliance.” “The INDI alliance was formed only out of selfishness. Theirs is a ‘kushti-dosti’ model, Left-Congress will wrestle in Kerala and be friends in Delhi, TMC-Congress will wrestle in Bengal and be friends in Delhi. This is not an alliance of commitment but an alliance of convenience, the public has rejected them and so it has become a tukde-tukde alliance.”
