AGARTALA: 2018 was the year of a seismic change in Tripura’s political landscape. For two decades the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) had been in power, with Manik Sarkar at the helm. But that year, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) that had won zero seats in 2013, broke the Left stranglehold and scripted an unprecedented victory, storming to power for the first time in the state in alliance with the Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (IPFT). Five tumultuous years later, which included a change in chief minister with less than a year to go for the polls, the BJP won a majority in the Tripura assembly election results declared on March 2, albeit with a margin that is more fragile.
In the 60-member assembly, the BJP won 32 of the 55 that it contested, while its ally, IPFT, won one seat, taking the tally of the alliance to 33. This is 11 seats fewer than in 2018, when the BJP won 36 on its own, and in a much stronger showing, the IPFT won eight seats.
The results likely mean that Manik Saha, who only became CM in May 2022, replacing Biplab Kumar Deb after allegations of underperformance, will return to helm the state government. Saha, who won his Town Bardowali seat defeating his Congress rival Asish Kumar Saha by 1,257 votes, said, “This victory is not unexpected and the clear mandate means a greater responsibility to work.”
“The victory was due to developmental work undertaken by the Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre and also the good work done by our state government. We were expecting to win around 40 seats. There will by an analysis of the results and review soon,” BJP state president Rajib Bhattacharjee, who lost from the Banamalipur seat, said.
Saha, in a tweet, also attributed the victory to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union home minister Amit Shah and BJP national president JP Nadda, and said that “the landslide victory is the reflection of people’s trust” in the leaders’ “development goals”.
In front of the BJP-IPFT in 2023 was an alliance between erstwhile foes, the CPM and the Congress that battled each other for years before the emergence of the BJP. Under the terms of their agreement, the CPM fought 47 seats and the Congress 13, but while the former won 11 seats, the latter could win only three, leaving them far short of a majority.
One of the three Congress leaders to win was party heavyweight Sudip Roy Barman, who said, “ We expected that the CPM-Congress combine will form the government. But it didn’t happen. We will sit and analyse to find out the weaknesses.”
This was also the first election in more than two decades that former CM and current leader of Opposition, Manik Sarkar, sat out, focusing instead on the CPM campaign across the state in a move that seemed to backfire, with the CPM also losing Dhanpur — Sarkar’s home turf.
The CPM expressed gratitude to the voters and said that it would continue to work in the interests of people in the coming days.
“The ruling party cadres attempted to attack the Opposition party activists, ransack Opposition party offices and tried to create unrest in the state. This is not welcome. We hope that the ruling party will play a responsible role. We also believe that police, administration and the Election Commission will adopt required steps in this regard,” read a press communique released by the CPM.
The elections also heralded the arrival in earnest of the Tipra Motha, a party helmed by former Congress leader Pradyot Kishore Debbarma which won 13 of the 42 seats it contested. The Motha, formed in the year 2021, had fought the election with indigenous pride at the centre of its campaign. It won close to 20% of the votes, and 13 of the 20 seats reserved for Scheduled Tribes in the state. Among the seats that it won was Charilam, where their candidate Subodh Debbarma beat deputy CM Jishnu Devvarma of the BJP by a margin of 858 votes.
“We accept the result given by voters and will continue to work for the development of the state. We were expecting to win 17-19 seats. We have some idea as to why we failed to reach that mark. A review of the results will be done soon,” said Tipra Motha president BK Hrangkhawl.
“Prior to voting, there was expectation that CPM-Congress combine would do exceedingly well and Tipra Motha will become kingmakers, but that didn’t happen. Some good work done by the BJP government and the decision to replace Biplab Deb as the CM and put Manik Saha in his place also worked in the party’s favour,” said Salim Shah, professor of economics, Tripura University.