Considering the socio-ethnic-religious composition of electorates in Assam, the stage is set for a triangular contest with the BJP succeeding in forming a formidable alliance against the ruling Congress and the All-India United Democratic Front, the second-largest party after the Congress in the Assam Assembly.
Though, the AIUDF, even after declaration of the elections on April 4 and 11, has been advocating for an alliance with the Congress to stop the BJP, the ruling Congress has decided to go it alone.
“The Congress and the AIUDF must come together because the BJP, AGP and BPF have already formed an alliance. There is no other option for us to stop the BJP,” AIUDF founder-president Maulana Badruddin Ajmal said. He doesn’t hesitate in expressing his disappointment on reluctance of Assam chief minister Tarun Gogoi for an alliance with the AIUDF.
Mr Gogoi, determined and confident to retain power in the state for the fourth consecutive term, is not ready to give up his plank for indigenous Assamese voters by distancing himself from the AIUDF, a party accused to have a pro-Bangladeshi image.
Encouraged by the success of the 2014 Lok Sabha elections and taking a lesson from defeat in Bihar, the BJP has not left anything to chance by roping in regional AGP in its fold.
Despite violent protests in the party, the BJP has been trying hard to make dents in the Congress strongholds and for this, it revived its friendship with the AGP.
Two-time chief minister and AGP stalwart Prafulla Kumar Mahanta, who considers himself to have little say in the party, says that on paper it is certainly a formidable alliance but both the AGP and the BJP will have to work hard to bring cohesiveness in the alliance. He said, “I don’t hold any post in the party and will go by the decision of the leadership but in my view, it is necessary for the leadership to go to the grassroots level workers to pacify them.”
Referring the widening protest in AGP and BJP opposing the alliance, Mr Mahanta said, “Both BJP and AGP will have to fine tune their coordination at the grassroots level in order to ensure complete transfer of votes to the candidates fielded by the alliance.”
He admitted that presence of Bodoland Peoples Front in the alliance is certainly going to brighten the prospect of the alliance.
Though, most of BJP leaders are inaccessible since the alliance was declared, the main architect of the alliance former minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has started campaigning for the party in Barrak Valley which is going to poll in first phase of polling on April 4. The insiders in the BJP say that leadership of the party is yet to take any initiative to reach out those grassroots workers resorting to violent protest against the alliance with AGP. Though, protest is said to have been backed by aspirants of the party ticket who lost their constituency in alliance.
