Contesting dominant politics in northeast India: Lok Sabha Election 2024

Shortly after assuming office in 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had hailed the eight sister states of the northeast as 'Ashta Lakshmi' (the Eight Lakshmis) making it adequately clear that the northeast region of the country would henceforth feature significantly not just in his developmental agenda but also the larger politics of the BJP.

Consolidating its mammoth victories nationally and the personality cult of the Prime Minister, the centrality of organisational politics seems to have helped construct dominant politics in the northeast and continues to define the success of the saffron party in the region. The dominant politics could be considered as the epiphenomenon of organisational politics and has certain key attributes. 

Expansion into new geographical and social territories, apart from anchoring the dominant politics in the civilisational narrative, remained the core pursuit of BJP’s electoral trajectory since 2014.

First, a multilevel alliance architecture with the National Democratic Alliance at the Centre, the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) at the regional level working with state-level parties, as well as collaboration with smaller ones and independents at the state level, for instance, as in Assam's Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR), astutely devised and implemented to prevent a split in the vote and contain the growth of Congress.

Second, the northeast being ideologically intrinsic to the BJP/RSS vision of 'Akhand Bharat', the assimilation of local cultures, heroes, and icons into the larger mold of Hindutva highlights the inseparable linkages between Hindus living far and wide. The Battle of Saraighat, which saw the Ahom Kings victorious against the Muslim invaders, often serves as a prominent lexicon of Hindu mobilisation.

Third, mutual interdependency and power relations seem well reflected as the regional parties are increasingly dependent on the dominant party i.e. the BJP and, in essence, the Centre for support to govern their respective states while the latter relies on its regional allies for maintaining its hegemonic hold over the politics of this crucial region, more specifically in Nagaland, Meghalaya, and Sikkim where its footprints thus far have remained rather limited.

Winning 16 out of the total 25 Lok Sabha seats from the region including 13 of the BJP and 3 from the NEDA allies, a net loss of 3 seats from the previous election with the Congress bagging 7 up from its tally of 4 seats last time, the results of the 2024 General Elections (Fig. 1) once again vindicated the centrality of organisational politics for sustained BJP dominance in the northeast.

Table 1:  Lok Sabha Election Results 2024 in Northeast India : Seats and Vote Share Attained and Changes since 2019 LS (Source : Election Commission of India)

The dominance, not being universal but rather graded, saw the BJP virtually sweep its states of unalloyed dominance, namely Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, and even Tripura once again, owing to demographics, strong local leadership, and a robust organisational mechanism.

Although in Assam, its allies the Asom Gana Parishad and United People's Party Liberal picked up seats, and the support of the Tipra Motha proved key in Tripura, where the BJP had won Assembly Elections in a tight race only a year ago when both had contested separately.

In the states of Meghalaya, Manipur, and Nagaland, where BJP’s dominance is consistently contested, the BJP-led NEDA was virtually wiped out, although the BJP's own tally declined by just one (Inner Manipur) owing to most of the seats being held by its allies, regional players who have dominated state politics, indicating a reversed relationship between the BJP and its allies in these states.

The NEDA lost both seats in Manipur to the Congress following a major ethnic strife in the state.

The Congress recovered the Tura seat in Meghalaya after losing it to BJP ally, the National People's Party in 2019, the Voice of the People Party (Meghalaya), a non-NDA party bagged the Shillong constituency while Nagaland's lone seat was won by Congress after virtually two decades of political oblivion ending the dominance of the Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party and Nagaland People's Front, both BJP allies.

If religious polarisation worked greatly in the BJP's favour in the states of unalloyed dominance, in states where the church remains a key player, palpable ethnic polarisation and a unified minority vote dented its prospects and those of its allies further contesting their dominance, in testimony to the northeast's civilisational diversity. 

In the two other states of Sikkim and Mizoram, where the BJP has tended to wield strategic dominance as the ruling Sikkim Krantikari Morcha (SKM) and the Zoram People's Front (ZPM) respectively seek equidistance from the BJP and the Congress but are ready to forge a harmonious relationship with the central dispensation for the growth and development of their states.

The 2024 results saw them repeat their Assembly poll successes at the Lok Sabha level with the SKM Member of Parliament even joining the recent NDA meet. A comprehensive analysis would thus suggest that while the BJP and its allies continue to be in pole position, the magnitude of dominance seems to have diminished given the Congress resurgence, closely replicating the scenario at the national level.

With the Modi factor never being the most determining crucible in the politics of the northeast, unlike other parts of the country, and its significance further on the wane after these elections as Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) surveys also confirm, could well throw up alternative alliance structures as the invincibility of the BJP seems to be taking a hit, allowing regional players to explore their options. The upcoming Assembly Elections could therefore prove far more competitive, leader centric, issue-based, and state-specific.

For instance, even in the state of Assam, the victory of Gaurav Gogoi from Jorhat constituency in Upper Assam region and the decline of the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) could help the Congress re-emerge as a viable alternative as the possibility of electoral alliance between the regionalist parties and Congress becomes strong.  However, one needs to be cautious that despite being in a more vulnerable position than the current BJP dispensation which secured its lowest tally in a decade to return to power, the Congress did manage to rule a majority of these states during the UPA regime (2004 - 2014) before losing all of them to the BJP-led NEDA in subsequent elections.

In a region that has historically displayed a greater propensity in responding to political change at the Centre and being in sync with the same, the BJP's dominance may come to be increasingly contested and challenged, but a complete overturn looks difficult at the moment. The political map of the northeast shall, therefore, continue to be drawn and redrawn depending on the BJP's ability to maintain its strategic alliances and ensure effective local leadership paralleled by the Opposition's attempts in tapping upon anti-incumbency and overcoming its internal factionalism while factoring in religious and ethnic sentiments, which shall keep determining electoral prospects and possibilities in the land of diversity and enigma.

A week being a long time in politics, how the prospects of dominant politics in the northeast evolve over the coming years shall continue to entice scholarship and the general audience at large.