The ‘Business as Usual’ Inertia of the Opposition and the Loss of Bihar

The Bihar election results stunned many, though they should not have. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led NDA swept the polls after deploying every available lever of state power – from the Election Commission’s controversial Special Investigation Review (SIR) of the voter list to Nitish Kumar’s blatantly illegal transfer of Rs. 10,000 to women voters after the poll schedule was announced. The opposition, meanwhile, ran on slogans of “vote chori” and vague promises like one government job per family. As in almost every election over the past decade, the contest was anything but free and fair.

Yet the more serious question is how the opposition, particularly the Congress, understood what it was up against. It showed no sign that it recognised the nature of the adversary or the scale of the political transformation underway. Trapped in its habitual “business as usual” inertia, it repeated the same script that has consistently delivered defeat.

The dismaying part is not merely the opposition’s paralysis but the failure of public intellectuals, policy analysts, and political commentators. At a time when the mainstream media functions largely as the ruling party’s megaphone, the role of independent thinkers becomes crucial. Instead, the commentary across op-ed pages, YouTube channels, academic forums, and civil society circles revealed a deeper malaise: a refusal to confront reality.

The same clichés resurfaced – ritualistic references to anti-incumbency, caste arithmetic, and last-minute “waves” – as if India still operated within a normal democratic frame. Their analyses remain shallow, strategically hollow, and oblivious to the structural changes that have transformed India’s political system. The systematic erosion of institutions, the scale of constitutional violations, and the collapse of democratic safeguards barely figure in their frameworks.

Was Bihar unpredictable?

After its brush with loss of power in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP abandoned any reliance on its pet strategy of communal polarisation and shifted instead to hard, systemic manipulation to secure electoral victories. This was evident in every post-2024 assembly election – Haryana, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, and Delhi. It won all of them except Jharkhand, a lone exception that conveniently sustains its cadres’ “what-aboutery” and helps maintain the illusion of institutional legitimacy before the public.

In three of these states, the Opposition’s defeat coincided with documented manipulation of electoral rolls – an exercise impossible without the active connivance of the Election Commission. The EC’s partisan behaviour was on full display in the way it brushed aside representations from Opposition leaders.

The pattern only hardened in Bihar. The EC’s push for the controversial SIR, executed with an opaque methodology and unmistakably partisan intent, left little doubt that the BJP intended to script the outcome long before a single vote was cast. Even a schoolchild understands that if the referee becomes an adversary, the match cannot be won. This should have jolted the Opposition into recognising the need for a commensurate political response – up to and including the option of boycotting an election whose integrity had already been gutted.

The Bihar verdict, therefore, was not some inscrutable political surprise. It was the natural culmination of a process that had been unfolding in plain sight. Yet the Opposition and the commentariat behaved as though nothing fundamental had shifted. Their conduct lulled voters into believing that the contest remained open, the institutions were neutral, and the familiar rhythms of electoral democracy still applied. This was not naïveté; it was abdication. By insisting on treating a structurally rigged contest as “business as usual,” they helped sanctify it.

Across op-eds, panel discussions, and editorial sermons, the same tired reassurances were rehearsed: that Indian elections remain competitive, that the system still has internal correctives, and that the ruling party could be restrained through normal political mobilisation. If one relied only on this interpretive class, one might mistake India for a functioning democracy rather than a state that has undergone dramatic structural alteration.

The electoral field is no longer level; oversight institutions have been bent into compliance; and executive power operates without real constraint. None of this is hidden. What is hidden – wilfully – is the acknowledgement of this reality by those who claim to speak truth to power.

The Opposition’s blindness is damaging, but the intellectuals’ and commentators’ evasion is worse. Their role is not merely to analyse but to expose the erosion of democratic norms. Instead, they have chosen to protect the fiction that the system is recoverable through better behaviour by voters or a more disciplined Opposition. This narrative is not just misleading; it is complicit. It reassures people that they still inhabit a familiar political universe when, in fact, the ground has shifted beneath them.

By refusing to confront the structural decay of the republic, the Opposition and the commentariat ended up legitimising the very processes hollowing it out. Bihar was not unpredictable. What was predictable – and tragic – was the establishment’s determination to act as though nothing had changed, even as the democratic façade crumbled in full view.

The process of BJP’s fortification

If the Opposition had performed its constitutional role, and if the intellectual and media commentariat had discharged even a fraction of their moral responsibility, the ongoing institutional decay could have been arrested. Instead, they failed utterly – allowing the BJP to fortify its power step by step and without meaningful resistance.

1. Financial engineering and electoral bonds

The most consequential transformation came in 2017-18 with the introduction of electoral bonds. Marketed as a transparency reform, the scheme institutionalised opacity and tilted political finance decisively toward the ruling party. Corporate donors – dependent on licenses, clearances, and state contracts – could donate anonymously, effectively shielding quid pro quo arrangements from public scrutiny.

Studies by ADR and independent researchers showed that the BJP cornered the overwhelming majority of bond-linked donations. This war chest translated into unmatched advertising, campaign logistics, digital outreach, and organisational penetration. Money became a weapon – its scale alone ensured that the BJP could dominate the political marketplace and drown out opposition campaigns.

2. Centralising bureaucratic and administrative control

Upon taking power, the BJP moved quickly to reshape the administrative state. Bureaucrats from Modi’s Gujarat regime were placed in key positions across Delhi, embedding long-term loyalty. Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) affiliates were installed across universities, regulatory bodies, cultural institutions, and research councils.

The introduction of “lateral entry” expanded this influence by placing handpicked technocrats – many ideologically aligned – into crucial policy and regulatory roles. Parallelly, the government attempted to exert control over judicial appointments through the NJAC, signalling a desire to subordinate the judiciary. Although the Supreme Court struck it down, the executive used other levers – delayed appointments, selective promotions, and transfers – to exert pressure. The cumulative effect has been a bureaucracy and judicial system hesitant to challenge the executive.

3. Weaponisation of investigative agencies

The Enforcement Directorate (ED), CBI, Income Tax Department, and National Investigation Agency (NIA) have been deployed as instruments of political discipline. The explosion in ED cases against opposition leaders – over 90% of whom belong to rival parties – speaks for itself. Investigations drag on for years without convictions; the process is punishment. Raids coincide with elections, coalition-building efforts, and internal party crises. This omnipresent threat cripples opposition parties, forcing leaders into silence, compromises, or defection.

4. Digital propaganda and media capture

No party in India has ever used the digital realm as aggressively as the BJP. Its IT cell operates as a professionalised, data-driven influence apparatus capable of manufacturing consensus, directing outrage, and smearing opponents at scale. Mainstream media, increasingly corporate-owned and dependent on government advertising, follows suit. Dissenting voices are marginalised, investigative journalism is stifled, and public debate is saturated with ruling-party narratives. Control over perception becomes as important as control over institutions.

5. Economic centralisation through NITI Aayog

The dissolution of the Planning Commission and creation of NITI Aayog consolidated economic governance under the PMO. The new body lacks federal checks, enabling the Centre to channel funds strategically and reward politically loyal states while undermining opposition-ruled ones. This centralisation of economic power reinforces political consolidation and weakens federalism.

6. Hindutva ideological consolidation

The BJP has successfully expanded its social base beyond upper-caste support, making deep inroads among OBCs, Dalits, and Adivasis. This realignment was achieved through a mix of religious nationalism, targeted welfare schemes, and the projection of Modi as a subaltern figure. Simultaneously, investments in cultural institutions, school curricula, heritage politics, and religious symbolism ensure that Hindutva becomes embedded in the social fabric. Electoral cycles come and go, but ideological normalisation persists.

7. Shrinking transparency and accountability

The weakening of the RTI Act and subordination of the Information Commission have eroded citizens’ ability to scrutinise state actions. This opacity aids political patronage networks, shields financial and administrative decisions, and protects the ruling party from democratic oversight. A culture of secrecy becomes a structural feature of governance.

8. State-level political engineering

The BJP’s aggressive defection politics – popularly known as “Operation Kamal” – has toppled or destabilised several opposition governments. These operations are enabled by inducements, coercive agency pressure, and strategic timing. The message is clear: electoral outcomes at the state level are conditional, reversible, and subject to central engineering.

9. Capture of the Election Commission

The Election Commission, once a vital democratic safeguard, has been progressively weakened. Its reluctance to act against glaring Model Code violations by ruling-party leaders and its promptness in pursuing complaints against opposition figures illustrate this transformation. The amendment replacing the Chief Justice of India on the appointment panel with a Union Minister effectively handed the total control over appointments to the Prime Minister. In a system already strained by institutional capture, a compromised Election Commission strikes at the heart of electoral integrity. Rather, it spell a death knell to democracy.

The opposition’s inadequate and misguided responses

While the BJP was constructing a formidable political machine, the opposition remained complacent, fragmented, and strategically adrift. Their failure is not episodic but structural.

1. Fragmented and reactive politics

Opposition parties respond to events rather than shaping them. They react after the BJP has already altered the political terrain – whether on electoral bonds, institutional capture, or federal encroachment. By the time they protest, the BJP has secured the advantage.

2. Overreliance on courts

Instead of sustained mobilisation, the opposition has taken every major political issue – from ED harassment to electoral bonds – to the courts. But the institutional ecosystem they rely on has already been compromised. Judicial interventions, when they come, are delayed, partial, or ineffective. Politics conducted through petitions rather than mass mobilisation weakens democracy.

3. Nominal unity and persistent distrust

Blocs like UPA or INDIA exist more on paper than on the ground. Seat-sharing quarrels, mutual suspicion, and regional rivalries prevent coordinated campaigns. The BJP exploits this through targeted defection strategies and region-specific welfare populism.

4. Failure to confront Hindutva

The opposition’s gravest failure is ideological. Instead of offering a clear constitutional counter-vision, opposition parties have adopted soft-Hindutva postures. This only legitimised the BJP’s terrain. Refusing to confront majoritarianism head-on, they have vacated the ideological battlefield.

5. Organisational hollowing

The BJP-RSS combine is a disciplined, cadre-based machine. The Congress, by contrast, is organisationally hollow, dependent on a few leaders and election-time campaigns. Regional parties remain family-centric and lack ideological grounding. With no grassroots presence, the opposition loses the booth-level contest before it begins.

6. Weak response to investigative agency abuse

Opposition leaders condemn raids but often fall silent after being targeted. Some quietly strike deals; others retreat from political activity. No collective defence strategy, legal team, or organisational mechanism exists to protect leaders or mobilise supporters against agency excess.

7. Inability to counter narrative domination

Opposition communication is amateurish. There is no coordinated digital presence, no data-driven strategy, no unified messaging. Complaints about media bias ring hollow when they have failed to invest in alternative media ecosystems or persistent communication infrastructure.

8. No response to defection politics

The opposition’s internal instability makes defections easy. Without ideological cohesion or internal democracy, parties cannot deter opportunistic leaders. BJP’s “Operation Kamal” thrives on this weakness.

9. Failure to rebuild social coalitions

While the BJP successfully courted OBCs, Dalits, and Adivasis, the opposition clung to outdated caste formulas and symbolic gestures. They failed to articulate a new framework of social justice that responded to contemporary aspirations and insecurities.

10. Weak federal resistance

Despite repeated assaults on federal norms – through fund withholding, governor interventions, and coercive agencies – opposition-led states have not formed a united federal bloc. The BJP’s centralising agenda proceeds uninterrupted.

11. The failure of Rahul Gandhi

Rahul Gandhi has certainly travelled a distance – from the days of flaunting his janeu and saffron robes to present himself as a Hindu devotee, to now projecting himself as a man of the masses. But his political instincts still reveal a misplaced reliance on personalised combat with Modi, a man whose political craft has been forged in the RSS school. Had Rahul Gandhi undertaken an honest SWOT analysis, he would have seen the futility of this approach. His real task lay in rebuilding the Congress organisation from its debilitated state and forging durable unity among the Opposition parties. His failure on both fronts has come at a heavy cost to the country.

A systemic crisis and a sleepwalking opposition

The BJP’s political dominance is not mysterious; it is the product of a decade-long project of institutional, ideological, financial, and organisational consolidation. What is astonishing is the opposition’s refusal to rethink politics beyond elections, slogans, and alliances. They have failed to recognise that they are confronting a centralised, coercive, data-driven, financially unmatched political machine backed by a vast ideological network.

India is drifting toward permanent authoritarian rule, yet the opposition responds with half-hearted alliances, court petitions, and media soundbites. Political commentators, meanwhile, recycle clichés that obscure rather than illuminate the crisis.

The BJP’s dominance endures not only because of its own strategy but because the opposition has abandoned politics as a mass, ideological, and organisational project. Until they face this reality, defeats like Bihar will continue – foretold, avoidable, and yet inevitable.

Bihar election confirms that the BJP will never lose an election in future unless it wanted to.

Anand Teltumbde is former CEO of PIL, professor of IIT Kharagpur, and GIM, Goa. He is also a writer and civil rights activist.

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