Janata Parivar: What's the point of returning?

Like a bad penny, the Janata Parivar refuses to go away. After years of being in political wilderness, the erstwhile constituents of the Janata Dal - RJD, JD(U), INLD, Samajwadi Party, JD(S) - have decided to merge and form a new party. This is not the first time that this band of politicians have come together: they first did it in 1977 (as Janata Party), then again in 1988 (as Janata Dal). And each time the experiment was short lived. Even their attempts to come together under one front - National Front and the United Front - have not lasted beyond a few years.

If the past is anything to go by, then serious question marks remain both over the viability, longevity and the durability of such an experiment. Little wonder then that their latest attempt to come together has met with more than a degree of scepticism. Their detractors see it as a desperate attempt to remain relevant. The leaders of the party in the making would have the world believe that the latest attempt is driven by the desire to provide a vigorous and credible opposition to the Modi led government, the long-term goal being to ultimately band together with other regional players to take on Modi in 2019.

If the merger does goes through, the new party will have 15 MPs in Lok Sabha, 30 in Rajya Sabha. It will account for 7.06 per cent of the vote, making it eligible for the status of a national party.  The merger could help the new party grab eyeballs by mounting a vigorous opposition to the  BJP in Parliament, especially in the Upper House, if they work in  tandem with the Congress and other Opposition parties.

Outside Parliament, however, the new party is likely to struggle. Assuming that they prove their naysayers wrong, and manage to stay together as single entity till the next general elections, there are two critical issues which they will need to work out if they want to merit consideration at the national level: one is the question of who they will project as a leader; the second, and equally important, is their vision for the country.

As far as the leadership question is concerned, for now, they appear to have settled on the SP Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav to head the new party. But come 2019, he will be over 80-years-old. JDS chief Deve Gowda will be 86 and RJD supremo Lalu Yadav, 71—compared to Narendra Modi, who will be just 68. Will the grand old men be an attractive enough proposition to the country's electorate, 65 per cent of which is below age 35. Former Bihar Chief Minister  Nitish Kumar, 68, is the only one who has both age and track record to emerge as an alternative to Modi. He enjoys a clean image and has the right credentials for good governance in Bihar. The big question, however, is will Mulayam Singh Yadav and Lalu Yadav be prepared to play second fiddle to Nitish?

The core of the proposed party's support base is undoubtedly centred around the old OBC- Muslim vote bank. This vote base may have some traction in Bihar and UP but  it's unlikely to yield much political dividends in the rest of the country. Modi's template for success has so far been the promise of development and has allowed him to  triumph over caste and other social combinations. Unless he fails miserably in delivering the kind economic progress he has promised, merely banking on caste calculations may not be enough for the new party to get the better of him.       

2019 is still a long way away. The viability of the new combine will be put to test next November in  Bihar and  in UP in 2017. If the leaders of the proposed party can rein in their personal ambitions in Bihar, they can provide a formidable challenge to the BJP—as was the case in the recent bye elections in the state  some months ago: the RJD, JD(U) and the Congress party won a majority of the seats . The coming together of these parties could cement the Yadav, Kurmi, Mahadalit and Muslim vote bank in the state. UP however is different case and until they find a way of bringing the BSP into the fold, which looks highly unlikely at the moment, they will have a steep mountain to climb.