Mamata Banerjee, MK Stalin defeat big setback to INDIA bloc

The opposition INDIA bloc suffered a setback on Monday as regional titans Mamata Banerjee of the Trinamool Congress and MK Stalin of the DMK lost their hometurfs West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, respectively, and the Kerala win of the Congress-led UDF was the only silver lining.
The impact of the election results will be felt deeply in national politics, with the cohesion of the INDIA bloc set to be tested after the fall of the state stalwarts and the BJP continuing with its winning momentum ahead of the next round of assembly elections in states including Uttar Pradesh.
The West Bengal results came as a huge blow not just to the TMC but to the entire opposition bloc, which has been struggling to keep the parties and cadres intact and upbeat. Only a few days ago, the INDIA bloc member Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) lost seven Rajya Sabha MPs to the BJP. And today, the defeat of Mamata Banerjee and Stalin spells a challenging road ahead for the anti-BJP alliance.
Having lost both West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, the opposition bloc would be forced to come together and stand united against a resurgent BJP. Leaders in the opposition alliance feel they have to rework their strategy and remain cohesive in the fight against the BJP.
The electoral reverses have also raised questions on the opposition strategy behind opposing the Constitution 131st Amendment Bill 2026 on the grounds that it sought to advance delimitation in the garb of 33 per cent women’s reservation.
West Bengal BJP leaders are already saying that the results in the state are a resounding rejection of the TMC which opposed the women’s quota legislation.
The Congress, DMK and SP too voted against it, prompting Prime Minister Narendra Modi to urge women to punish these parties.
For the Congress, the results in Kerala come as a face-saver after a series of election debacles in Maharashtra, Delhi, Haryana and Bihar.
The party is now in power in three southern states of Karnataka, Telangana and Kerala, besides Himachal Pradesh. It will face assembly polls in Himachal later next year.
The loss in Assam, however, does not bode well for the party as it failed to dislodge the BJP which has been in power there for a decade. The BJP under Himanta Biswa Sarma registered an emphatic victory with a two-thirds majority.
The outcome is a major upset, especially given the party had rallied behind its media chairman Pawan Khera after Assam police took action against him for his allegations that Sarma’s wife held multiple passports, a charge she denied.
The Congress got around 29.5 per cent of the votes in Assam, while it got 28.8 per cent votes in Kerala. In West Bengal, the party polled only 3.13 per cent votes and got 3.38 per cent votes in Tamil Nadu.
It is likely to win a lesser number of seats in Assam than it did even the last time.
The Monday results are also likely to have a bearing on the 2027 election cycle when key battleground states of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Goa and Uttarakhand go to polls.
For the Congress, which leads the INDIA segment, the top challenge will be to keep the alliance relevant and find narratives that can bring all regional players together on one platform as the BJP consolidates gains after the 2024 setback when it failed to garner a majority on its own in the Lok Sabha.
After the poll results, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi spoke to Mamata Banerjee and Stalin. He also congratulated the President of the TVK Vijay on the party’s performance, said Jairam Ramesh.
The Congress said the poll results in states other than Kerala have fallen short of expectations but it will not be disheartened and will continue this fight for ideology.
Ramesh asserted that the Congress is waging an ideological struggle.
“The path of the struggle for democracy and truth against authoritarianism and falsehood is invariably long and arduous. Nevertheless, we will continue to forge ahead with unwavering resolve and steadfast determination,” he said, adding that it will soon conduct a comprehensive analysis of the poll results.
Enthused by its victory in Assam, West Bengal and Puducherry, the BJP said the election results have exposed “deep cracks” in the INDIA bloc and that the opposition alliance has no future.
The party also hit out at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, saying he has failed to effectively steer the alliance and is again absent on the counting day.