If Punjab is left aside, almost all the state governments in the country are running either on the strength of BJP or Congress. The sovereignty of regional parties is now coming to an end. Last month, Joseph Vijay Thalapathi's TVK emerged as a major regional power in Tamil Nadu. But that too was 12 MLAs away from majority. In such a situation, Congress took the initiative and 5 of its MLAs broke from the DMK alliance and joined TVK, then the possibility of forming the Vijay Thalapathy government became stronger. Out of the remaining 4 state assemblies, Congress formed the government in Kerala and BJP formed the government with a clear majority in Assam and West Bengal. Rangasamy is already in the NDA alliance in Puducherry. In a way, Congress is in power in three out of the five states of South India. In one it has its support and Andhra's TDP government is in the NDA alliance. Puducherry is a union territory. There is NDA government here also.
Similarly, on this side of Vindhya, only Congress is able to survive on its own in Himachal and Hemant Soren government of Jharkhand also has the support of Congress. These situations are showing that in the coming years only two political parties will be left in the country, either BJP or Congress. All other regional parties will join India or NDA alliance as per their convenience. However, there are regional parties in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and Punjab and 6 states of the North East. Their very existence is now at stake. The results of May 2026 have shattered Mamata Banerjee's TMC and the developments of June 17 have completely weakened Uddhav Thackeray's power in Maharashtra. There was already a breach among its MLAs and now it is time for its MPs too to leave. This seems to be directly benefiting the BJP, which is desperate to increase its strength in the Parliament continuously from 2024.
To increase its strength, it is BJP's compulsion to merge regional parties with itself or make some compromise or bring them into its alliance. It has to increase its strength in the Lok Sabha and also in the Rajya Sabha. Without this, BJP cannot fulfill many of its promises. Apart from this, BJP will be able to implement its agenda One Nation One Election only when there are only two main parties in the country. Like Europe and America, there should be only Liberal and Conservative parties in Parliament. The remaining parties should join those parties as per their convenience which suits them. That is why NDA and UPA alliance was formed. Because the more regional parties there are, the more agenda there will be and then no national party will be able to implement its agenda. From 1996 onwards, national political parties started going out of power on their own.
NDA was formed in May 1998 on the initiative of BJP. At that time BJP's objective was to oust Congress from power. Such attempts had been made twice before and both times the experiment failed. For the first time in 1977, when the Janata Party government was formed. But Janata Party's experiment failed. At that time all the leaders were not ready to accept any alliance due to their own ego. The Morarji Desai government came to power on 24 March 1977 and collapsed on 28 July 1977 due to internal strife. Congress played a major role in bringing it down. Congress took Chaudhary Charan Singh with it and promised that he should bring his supporters from within the Janata Party and Congress will help him in forming the government. Chaudhary Saheb got influenced by Indira Gandhi's words. On July 28, he formed the government with the help of Congress but before the trust vote, Indira Gandhi withdrew her support.
Chaudhary Charan Singh government fell without facing Parliament. In this way, Indira Gandhi proved with her strategic acumen that only Congress can run the government. Chaudhary Charan Singh remained on the throne as interim Prime Minister till 14 January 1980. Indira Gandhi again became Prime Minister with a huge majority. This attempt was made for the second time in 1989 when Vishwanath Pratap Singh formed the government with the help of the crutches of BJP and Left Front. But this non-Congress front government could not complete even one year. On December 2, 1989, VP Singh took oath as Prime Minister and on November 10, 1990, his government fell. Congress again took advantage of this. He assured Chandrashekhar, the rebel group of Janata Dal, that if you form the government, Congress will support you. Chandrashekhar became Prime Minister on 10 November 1990.
But, Congress played the gamble again. Party president and former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi withdrew support from the Chandrashekhar government in four and a half months. As a result Chandrashekhar resigned from the post on 5 March 1991. Then Lok Sabha elections were announced, but in the meantime, on 21 May 1991, Rajiv Gandhi, who had gone to address an election rally in Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu, was assassinated by LTTE supporters. The wind blew in favor of Congress but it did not get majority and Narasimha Rao became Prime Minister on 21 June 1991 with 244 seats in the Lok Sabha. He ran a minority government for five years. In between, he would play such games that the no-confidence motion against his government could not be passed. 14 members of the opposition voted in his favor on the no-confidence motion on 28 July 1993, but in the 1996 elections, Congress got only 140 seats.
BJP had got 161 seats in this election. In such a situation, President Shankar Dayal Sharma, seeing the largest party, called BJP to form the government. Atal Bihari Vajpayee became Prime Minister. But they could not prove majority and the government went to power in just 13 days. After this, non-Congress and non-BJP opposition together formed a joint front. With the efforts of CPM's Harikishan Singh Surjit, Congress announced its support to the United Front and HD Deve Gowda took oath as Prime Minister on June 1, 1996. Congress President Sitaram Kesari said, change the Prime Minister. Then on 21 April 1997, Inder Kumar Gujral of the United Front became the Prime Minister. But, Congress withdrew support on 28 November 1997 and he handed over the chair to BJP's Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee on 19 March 1998 and had to step down from the post.
Meanwhile, on March 14, Sonia Gandhi took over the presidency of Congress. In the Lok Sabha elections held in February-March, BJP got 182 seats and Congress 141 seats. Atal Bihari Vajpayee became Prime Minister again. This time BJP formed an alliance with regional parties. He ran the government on the basis of this alliance named NDA but after thirteen months in 1999, his government fell by just one vote. But, after this, the public also started getting bored with the bargaining of regional parties. He felt that there should be a strong government at the centre. In the 1999 elections, the NDA alliance got good success and Atal Bihari Vajpayee's government was formed for the third time. This time the government completed its tenure. But BJP lagged behind in the 2004 Lok Sabha elections. It got 138 seats in the Lok Sabha and Congress got 145 seats. At the same time Congress formed its alliance with UPA.
In 2004, the Congress-led UPA government was formed and Manmohan Singh was appointed Prime Minister. This government also had the support of Left MPs. Rather, the post of Lok Sabha Speaker went to CPM's Somnath Chatterjee. But in 2006, Manmohan Singh government completed the India-US nuclear deal with President Bush. With this agreement, the then CPM General Secretary Prakash Karat withdrew support from the Manmohan Singh government. But due to jugaadbaazi, the Manmohan government completed its first term and in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, Congress alone got 206 seats in the Lok Sabha. Manmohan Singh became the Prime Minister again, but the regional parties sitting in this government started pulling the legs of Dr. Manmohan Singh with their respective powers. Due to Anna movement and BJP's attacks and propaganda, Congress was reduced to only 44 in 2014.
Narendra Modi government was formed in 2014. At that time BJP got majority on its own by taking 282 seats. But, BJP gave respect to NDA's allies. In 2019, BJP's seats crossed 300 and if NDA was included, this number was 352. Whereas Congress got stuck at 52. Since then, competition began between both the national parties to increase their allies. In 2024, SP's Akhilesh Yadav came up with PDA formula and joined the India alliance with Congress. It was due to the hard work of Akhilesh Yadav that BJP stopped at only 33 in Uttar Pradesh. Whereas Congress got 6 seats and SP got 37 seats. This time BJP got 240 seats in the Lok Sabha but with the addition of NDA the count became 293. In this way Narendra Modi formed the government for the third time. But, a lesson was learned that the fight should be between two national parties.
Congress has also understood from the victory and defeat in the assembly elections of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, West Bengal, Assam and Puducherry in 2026 that the two-party system can save it too. Regional parties can increase their numbers in any one state but cannot make the party nationwide. That is why he supported TVK in Tamil Nadu. On the other hand, BJP has destroyed TMC in West Bengal. RJD in Bihar is in its worst days in history. In Maharashtra, Uddhav's Shiv Sena broke up in 2022 and now even its MPs are not able to be controlled. Sharad Pawar's NCP also met the same fate and Shiromani Akali Dal has also sunk. Then the only option is to choose either BJP or Congress. Otherwise our area will also be lost. The Punjab government of Aam Aadmi Party has survived but the MPs have gone.
