Explain the factors for the growth of regional party in India?
Answers
In 1992, Czechoslovakia broke up into 2 countries – Czech Republic and Slovakia. Political thinkers widely agree that regional political parties played a major role in this, as prior to dissolution, the local citizens of both countries preferred to remain together as one country.
At another place in roughly the same time, Yugoslavia also broke up into different countries. The reasons, however, were entirely different. In a position very similar to India, they had many ethnic groups such as Albanians, Bosnian Muslims, Macedonians, Croats, Hungarians, Montenegrins, Serbs, and Slovenes, each having a reasonably distinct language, history, culture, and a history of ethnic conflict. There was a dearth of nationalist parties catering to all groups, with the result that in the 1991 polls, Franjo Tudjman’s Croatian Democratic Union and Milosevic’s Socialist Party of Serbia won only 41.5% and 47% of the votes respectively but gained 56% and 78% of the seats.
The country eventually broke up into 5 different countries in 1992. The death toll in the eventual breakup is estimated at roughly 200,000.
On a contrary note, Indian political thinkers have noted a correlation between rising political participation and patriotism amongst the Indians and the rise of regional parties since the 1990s.
This article will be helpful in understanding how regional parties work and what their growth has resulted in.
Regional parties work on 4 major planks – identity, statehood, autonomy and development. Autonomy consists of demanding greater powers to the states (like the National Conference in Jammu and Kashmir)