The Trinamul Congress(TMC) which
was recently ousted from power in politically sensitive eastern Indian state of
West Bengal following its rout in the crucial elections to the state assembly
received another major setback after rebels in the party successfully
engineered splits in the state legislature as well as parliament units of the
regional outfit raising a flag of revolt against party founder and president Mamata
Banerjee and her nephew Abhisek whom she was trying to promote and project as
her successor.
TMC
is not the only anti-BJP party to face such post-election infighting. Similar
rebel activities had also been witnessed in other political parties like
Nationalist Congress Party(NCP)and Siva Sena in western Indian state of
Maharashtra as well as in Delhi based Aam
Admi Party(AAP). Observers are of the view that this type of revolts in
the non-BJP parties would be having a negative impact on the opposition unity
at the national level.
Like
TMC, both the Maharashtra based parties had witnessed vertical split of their
respective parties. The Delhi headquartered AAP has not yet recorded a formal
spilt but has already faced intense rebel activities including resignation of a
few of its Members of Parliament(MPs) a month and half back which had a major
impact on the parties’ public image. All these AAP MPs have joined the BJP.
All
these parties blame the BJP for the disturbances in their respective outfits.
According to them, the ruling party at the centre is engineering and fanning
trouble in the anti-BJP parties to weaken the opposition unity. However,
analysts disagree. They are of the view that the leadership of these parties
miserably failed to keep their houses in order for various reasons, particularly
after the electoral debacles which triggers squabbling and infighting among
party ranks and leaders. “There was something fundamentally wrong in all these
opposition parties. The leadership of these outfits must identify their own
mistakes and initiate corrective measures as early as possible before it is too
late’’, a senior analyst was heard saying while participating on a TV debate.
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