A jubilant Prime Minister Narendra Modi – celebrating his Bharatiya Janata Party’s win in the 2025 Delhi election – ripped into an already battered Congress in a victory speech Saturday evening, accusing his rival of “stealing” agendas and voters from its allies, and “finishing (them), one by one”.
In a long speech at the BJP’s city HQ, he launched a ferocious attack, calling the Congress a “parasite party” and mocking it for failing to win a single seat in six consecutive major Delhi elections; the party has won zero seats in each of the last three state and federal elections in the city.
“I have said before… the Congress is a parasite party. They take other parties with them whenever they are drowning. Their method is unique… they steal their agendas and then target their voters. In Uttar Pradesh, they are targeting the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party voters,” he said.
“They are doing the same thing in Tamil Nadu (where the ruling DMK is an ally) and Bengal and Jammu and Kashmir. It is clear… whoever holds Congress’ hands, their end is inevitable.”
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“Those who are holding the Congress’ hands are getting destroyed… because it is not the same Congress that was there before Independence… today it is doing ‘urban Naxal’ politics. They want to bring anarchy… and AAP-da (the BJP’s pejorative term for the AAP) was trying to do the same.”
The Prime Minister’s broadside at the Congress comes amid increasing uncertainty over the INDIA opposition bloc led by the party. Formed in June 2023 to defeat the BJP in state and federal elections, the group has floundered and flattered to impress in most of the 14 major polls since; the exception, perhaps, was the Lok Sabha election in April-June last year, in which the BJP was held to <300 seats.
And the Congress has come under fire for failing to agree seat-share deals with smaller INDIA bloc members, including the AAP. The two parties, which joined hands for the Delhi Lok Sabha election (which ended in a BJP clean sweep anyway) were expected to re-ally for last year’s Haryana poll.
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That, however, did not happen after the Congress’ state unit simply refused to play ball. Similarly, expectations of an AAP-Congress deal before the Delhi election were also dashed.
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In each case the AAP and Congress’ vote shares combined would have been more than that won by the BJP. Whether that would have translated to more votes is unclear, but it does indicate there is still space for a non-BJP coalition front, so long as it is functions long enough to contest an election.
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A functional opposition front may still not be enough to defeat Mr Modi and his BJP’s formidable election-winning machinery, but it will, at the least, make elections more closely fought.