By Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury

The Judge Speaks — and a Nation Hears Its Own Name

On May 15, 2026, a Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice Surya Kant was hearing a contempt petition about fraudulent professional credentials. What followed was unremarkable in juridical terms but seismic in political ones. The Chief Justice, speaking from the highest bench in the land, reportedly compared unemployed youth who drift into activism, journalism and RTI-filing to 'cockroaches' and 'parasites of society.' He later insisted that his remarks were aimed specifically at those wielding fake degrees — not at unemployed youth broadly. But the damage, as they say in Delhi, was done.

In a nation of 1.4 billion people, where 40% of graduates aged 25 and younger are currently unemployed — a figure cited by the Azim Premji University's State of Working India 2026 report — those three words landed not as a clarification, but as a confession. They confirmed what tens of millions of Indians had long suspected: that the powerful regard the struggling masses not as citizens deserving redress, but as inconvenient noise. Within 24 hours, that noise became a roar.

"Those in power think citizens are cockroaches and parasites. They should know that cockroaches breed in rotten places. That's what India is today."  — Abhijeet Dipke, Founding President, CJP

Abhijeet Dipke, a 30-year-old Boston University public relations student and former political communications strategist, posted a simple question on X (formerly Twitter) the following day: 'What if all cockroaches come together?' He launched the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) — a satirical, unregistered digital movement — on May 16, 2026. The name was a pointed play on the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Its eligibility criteria were stripped of all pretence: to join, one needed only to be unemployed, lazy, chronically online, and capable of 'ranting professionally.' Within a week, the CJP amassed over 22 million Instagram followers, more than double the BJP's official account — a party that has governed India for over a decade and describes itself as the world's largest political organisation.

The Anatomy of a Gagged Republic

To understand why a mocking online platform exploded into a mass movement, one must first understand the pressure cooker it emerged from. India's democratic decline is no longer a matter of academic debate. The V-Dem Institute's Democracy Report 2026 classifies India as an 'electoral autocracy' — a status it has held since 2017. According to the report, the average global citizen's experience of democracy has regressed to 1978 levels; in South and Central Asia, the decline is even steeper, reaching benchmarks last seen in 1976 — a trajectory driven substantially by India's backsliding.

The term 'electoral autocracy' requires unpacking. It does not describe a country without elections. India holds them — with remarkable efficiency and scale. What it describes is a country where elections persist but the ecosystem around them decays: where the press faces structural intimidation, where civil society organisations are regulated into submission or delegitimised as foreign agents, where opposition leaders face investigative agency raids timed to electoral cycles, where judiciary independence is questioned, and where constitutional language is invoked while its spirit is hollowed out. This is what scholars call 'executive aggrandizement' — elected leaders slowly capturing the institutions designed to constrain them.

The casualties are not abstract. For India's educated unemployed, the daily reality is an unemployment rate of 9.9% among 15-29-year-olds nationally, rising to 13.6% in urban areas per official 2025 data — and 40% among graduates under 25, by independent estimates. For the labouring poor, gig economy exploitation and the collapse of formal employment guarantees define survival. For women, persistent under-representation in Parliament, cabinets and party leadership persists despite decades of constitutional promise. For Dalits and minorities, the intersection of economic exclusion and everyday humiliation — sharpened under a political climate where majoritarian identity politics has become the dominant grammar of governance — renders citizenship itself precarious. For all of them, the traditional channels of democratic expression — the newsroom, the university, the courtroom, the street protest — have narrowed, been criminalised, or been captured.

In this landscape, a 2026 Draft IT Rules proposal seeking to extend regulatory oversight to independent digital content creators represents not merely a policy measure but the deliberate elimination of the last relatively free space in Indian public life. When the street is watched, the university is cautious, the newsroom is pressured, and the social media handle is next — the pressure-cooker either explodes or finds strange release valves. The Cockroach Janta Party was one such valve.

Why the Old Parties Cannot Hear the Roach Underthe Floor

The rise of the CJP exposes a structural failure that both the ruling establishment and the main opposition parties must confront — though neither shows signs of doing so. The BJP has, over its decade in power, mastered the art of translating popular anxiety into electoral capital. Economic insecurity becomes nationalist pride. Unemployment becomes the enemy's sabotage. Dissent becomes anti-nationalism. Critics become urban elites, toolkit operators or foreign-funded conspirators. This grammar is remarkably effective at winning elections. It is, however, entirely incapable of genuinely addressing the grievance of a 24-year-old commerce graduate in Patna who has appeared for 14 competitive examinations — three of which were compromised by paper leaks — and has spent six years waiting for a government job that pays a living wage.

The main opposition — primarily the INDIA Bloc alliance led by the Indian National Congress — has legitimate grievances, credible leaders, and occasional moments of potent parliamentary resistance. Yet it too has struggled to convert diffuse mass anger into sustained organisational imagination. Opposition parties endorse viral outrage. They sign up to the CJP membership drive. Shashi Tharoor told the Indian Express that the CJP's popularity revealed 'the extent to which there is frustration and dissatisfaction among India's youth.' Mahua Moitra and Kirti Azad enrolled as CJP members. But endorsing a meme is not the same as building the booth-level infrastructure through which the unemployed graduate, the contract labourer, the Dalit student, or the young woman demanding political agency can act collectively and sustainably.

This is precisely the vacuum the CJP walked into. It was not born in a party office. It was born in the gulf between institutional politics and citizen desperation — in the space where formal democracy says 'vote every five years' but offers no mechanism for the voice of the helpless between elections. As YouTuber Meghnad S observed, the popularity of a satirical non-existent party is 'a giant commentary on Indian political parties in general.' That commentary is worth heeding.

Twenty-Two Million Cockroaches: The Digital Public Square

The numbers demand attention. In less than a week, the CJP amassed over 22 million Instagram followers, nearly 4 lakhGoogle Form sign-ups for 'membership,' and over 2 lakh X followers before that account was withheld in India. By contrast, the BJP — the self-described world's largest political party, in power for over a decade with the resources of the state and its IT cell — had 8.8 million Instagram followers. The Indian National Congress, the principal opposition, had 13 million. A satirical movement run by one sleep-deprived 30-year-old from a Chicago apartment had outstripped them both.

These numbers are not just a curiosity. They represent the aggregate of India's unexpressed political frustration finding a language — absurdist, mocking, self-deprecating, but unmistakably political. The hashtag #MainBhiCockroach ('I too am a cockroach') became a shorthand for a shared identity of exclusion. Students who had endured NEET paper leaks joined alongside informal workers invisible to policy, alongside women tired of being spoken about rather than heard, alongside Dalit youth who had faced casteist abuse online the moment they raised their voices, alongside minority citizens who felt the weight of majoritarian suspicion in every institutional encounter.

The CJP manifesto — even in its satirical register — made five serious demands: a ban on post-retirement rewards for judges, 50% reservation of Parliament and Cabinet seats for women, protection of voting rights, an independent press, and a 20-year ban on political party-switching. These are not fringe demands. They are cornerstones of democratic accountability. That they had to be wrapped in cockroach imagery to be heard at scale tells us something profound about the state of India's democratic public sphere.

The State Blinks — and in Blinking, Reveals Everything

Nothing has validated the CJP's central thesis more powerfully than the Indian government's response to it. Within days of the movement's launch, the CJP's official X account — which had gathered over 2 lakh followers — was withheld in India following a directive from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) under Section 69(A) of the Information Technology Act, 2000. The stated justification, according to reports citing Intelligence Bureau inputs, was that the account's content posed risks to 'national security and sovereignty.' By May 23, the CJP website itself had been blocked. The Instagram account, with over 16 million followers at the time, was placed under surveillance. Impersonation accounts created to confuse supporters were reportedly linked to ruling-party digital operatives.

The intimidation did not stop at digital platforms. AbhijeetDipke, physically located in the United States, began sharing WhatsApp screenshots of death threats received from unknown numbers. One message warned him to delete the CJP account and join the BJP — or face being 'killed in America.' Another implied the sender had knowledge of his parents' location in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Maharashtra. His parents, alarmed, reportedly begged him to abandon the project. The Print reported messages suggesting they would find his address 'in no time.' Dipke posted publicly: 'Nobody's family should be hounded.' He declined to shut down. 'Cockroaches never die,' he wrote.

"You can hack and withhold the accounts but you cannot hack this movement. Every attack makes cockroaches stronger."  — Abhijeet Dipke, May 23, 2026

The political conspiracy theories arrived in rapid succession, each more implausible than the last. Because Dipke had volunteered for the Aam Aadmi Party between 2020 and 2023, the movement was branded an 'AAP venture' designed to stealth-destroy democratic opposition space. Former minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar described the CJP as a 'cross-border influence operation targeting Prime Minister Modi.' Union minister Sukanta Majumdar alleged suspicious patterns in the movement's overseas follower base. The CIA and the American Deep State were invoked. Pakistan-based botaccounts were cited. Former civil servant Ashish Joshi quit the movement demanding transparency, while educationist Sandeep Manudhane publicly warned citizens to 'beware' of the enterprise. All of this, in response to a satirical Instagramaccount run by a PR student.

The paradox is worth dwelling on. A regime that routinely claims strength, mandate, and popular legitimacy treated a satirical movement — whose own manifesto was framed as absurdist comedy — as a national security threat severe enough to invoke intelligence bureau action, platform suppression, and the intimidation of a founder's elderly parents. As opposition legislator Shashi Tharoor noted, this response tells us far more about the government's anxieties than about the CJP's power. The overreaction is, as the CJP's supporters have correctly noted, not a refutation of the movement's diagnosis — it is its confirmation.

Broad Conclusions: Frustration Has Gone Subterranean

Several conclusions emerge from this episode with uncomfortable clarity. The first is that India's democraticfrustration is no longer episodic or single-issue. The CJP's traction cannot be explained by any one grievance — not exam paper leaks alone, not unemployment alone, not judicial insensitivity alone. What the movement crystallised is a cumulative emotional economy of resentment, in which joblessness, inflation, caste humiliation, communal anxiety, institutional distrust, gender exclusion, and media capture have fused into a single collective experience of being ungoverned rather than governed, of being managed rather than represented.

The second conclusion is that India's democratic crisis has both an institutional and a psychological dimension. Many citizens continue to vote enthusiastically. But the reduction of democratic participation to periodic voting — while everyday forms of protest are delegitimised, surveilled, or criminalised— produces what might be called thin democracy: the form without the substance, the ritual without the meaning. When constitutional rights must be exercised in cockroach costume to avoid suppression, the form of democracy has survived but its spirit has been evacuated.

Third: digital mobilisation is now the de facto public square for India's youth — and it is a dangerously fragile one. Accounts can be suspended, withheld, throttled, flooded with impersonators, or drowned in organised trolling. The CJP's rapid encounter with platform suppression, just days after its founding, illustrates that the digital sphere — though vast — is ultimately navigable by state power. Section 69(A) of the IT Act is a blunt instrument, but it is available, and the current establishment has demonstrated no reluctance to use it.

Fourth and finally: contempt can become combustible. The Chief Justice's remarks — whatever their intended target — were heard by millions as elite disdain for the structurally excluded. That hearing produced solidarity at scale, across class, caste, gender and regional lines, with remarkable speed. When the powerful call the powerless parasites, they sometimes inadvertently create the very mass identity they sought to dismiss.

Three Futures: Dissipation, Civic Pressure, or Political Formation

The CJP now stands at a crossroads with three plausible trajectories. The first and most likely, absent deliberate strategy, is dissipation. Many online movements burn bright and briefly — a viral event, a few petitions, some international coverage, and then gradual fade under the twin pressures of state intimidation and audience fatigue. The platform suppressions have already begun. Dipke has expressed intent to continue, but the movement's leadership remains concentrated in one person, operating from abroad, without formal structure or legal infrastructure in India.

The second route is becoming a sustained civic pressure platform — and this is the most strategically viable path. The CJP need not contest elections to matter. It can become a constitutional youth accountability forum focused on employment, exam integrity, women's political representation, RTI campaigns, anti-caste protections, minority rights, judicial accountability, and media independence. It can build issue papers, coordinate legal challenges, and link its digitally native base with the offline struggles of farmers' movements, trade unions, women's groups and Dalit rights organisations. This is the 'societal engine' that the V-Dem Institute's research identifies as essential to democratic defence — and democratic recovery.

The third route is political formation — the riskiest and most complex path. A transition to formal party status would expose the CJP to legal scrutiny, resource constraints, ideological incoherence, infiltration, and the perennial risk of personality cult. If it moves too fast, it fractures. If it delays too long, it loses momentum. The challenge, if this path is chosen, is building organisation without being captured — by partisan interests, by state surveillance, or by the very electoral arithmetic it seeks to disrupt.

What Must Be Done: From Digital Catharsis to Democratic Architecture

If CJP's founders and supporters intend something more than a cathartic meme, specific institutional discipline is required. Transparent funding — crowdsourced, publicly audited, with no corporate or partisan dependencies — is non-negotiable if conspiracy allegations are to be pre-empted rather than merely rebutted. Decentralised leadership is equally essential: a movement that lives or dies with Dipke's personal safety and freedom of movement is a movement with a single point of failure that the state has already demonstrated willingness to target.

A legal defence team and digital security infrastructure are urgent necessities, not optional add-ons. The CJP must also build a moderation and fact-checking unit — not only to repel state-directed trolling, but to ensure the movement does not itself become a vehicle for misinformation, hate speech, or mob behaviour. A clear constitutional charter — explicitly committed to non-violence, anti-caste equality, gender justice, secular citizenship, labour dignity and institutional accountability — is needed to define what the CJP stands for, not merely what it stands against.

Most critically, the CJP must migrate from anger to agenda. Sonam Wangchuk, who declared himself an 'honorary cockroach,' understood instinctively that the movement'sresonance comes from its emotional authenticity — but emotional authenticity without programmatic clarity cannot generate lasting policy change. The isolated acts of symbolic protest — volunteers dressed as cockroaches cleaning the Yamuna riverbank, local rallies in Rohtak, the Bengaluruhuman chain that was pre-emptively denied permission by police citing a High Court order — must evolve into a coordinated national strategy of non-violent civic resistance rooted in specific, achievable demands.

What This Means for Indian Democracy: The Elected Autocracy Looks into the Mirror

The CJP experiment is the most vivid commentary on the state of Indian democracy in the 21st century precisely because it was not designed to be commentary at all. It began as absurdist humour and became political diagnosis. And what it has diagnosed — corroborated by V-Dem data, by independent economic research, by the plain evidence of the government's response — is a democracy that continues to hold elections while systematically eliminating the conditions that make elections meaningful.

V-Dem's classification of India as an 'electoral autocracy' is contested by the ruling establishment, which regards the label as foreign interference or opposition propaganda. But the CJP episode gives that classification a lived texture that no dataset alone can supply. Elections continue — but fear spreads. Citizens speak — but often through parody, because direct speech has been made costly. Youth organise — but accounts are withheld by intelligence directive. A founder's family is threatened because a satirical Instagram account became inconveniently popular. Constitutional language is invoked — 'peaceful, democratic, within the Constitution,' as Dipkehimself repeatedly and deliberately emphasised — and the response is blocking, surveillance, conspiracy theories, and WhatsApp death threats.

This is precisely what democratic erosion looks like in its 21st-century form. Not tanks. Not midnight arrests of all opposition leaders. Not the abolition of elections. Instead: the incremental normalisation of intimidation, the weaponisationof digital infrastructure against citizen expression, the deployment of conspiracy theories to delegitimise dissent before it can crystallise into organisation, and the cultivation of a climate in which the rational response to public engagement is private fear.

The task before India — before its citizens, its opposition, its institutions, and its civil society — is not to crush the cockroach metaphor but to listen to why 22 million people sought shelter in it. India's democracy has survived worse crises, including the Emergency of 1975-77, when the comparison with today is not merely rhetorical but is being made by serious constitutional scholars who lived through both. It survived because citizens acted — in courts, in newspapers, in elections, in streets, in cultural resistance. The question is whether the current generation of citizens, faced with a more sophisticated and digitally equipped form of democratic erosion, will find equivalent resolve.

"Democracy survives not when power is protected from citizens, but when citizens are protected from power.

Whether the Cockroach Janta Party fades into internet memory or evolves into a catalyst for democratic renewal remains genuinely open. But its legacy is already secure: it has revealed the depth of a nation's frustration, the fragility of a regime's confidence, and the endurance — even in the most suffocating political conditions — of the human impulse to mock the oppressor and insist on dignity. Cockroaches, as Abhijeet Dipke noted, never die. In the context of India's receding democracy, one can only hope the same holds true for the voice of youth.

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By Prof. Ujjwal Chowdhury

The Moment Before the Verdict

As of 3 May 2026, Bengal stands in that charged interval between voting and verdict. The queues have ended, the slogans have faded, the booth agents have filed their last reports, and counting is scheduled for 4 May. Yet the political story already has a shape. It is not a story of a government without anger against it. It is not a story of an opposition without energy. It is not even a story of a state fully satisfied with its present condition. It is a story of comparative trust: between a ruling party that has entered the household through welfare, organisation and identity, and a challenger that has expanded dramatically but still has not become a sufficiently trusted governing alternative in Bengal.

The Trinamool Congress is likely to win this election not because every Bengali voter is content, and not because the BJP has failed to create anti-incumbency. TMC is likely to win because, in the lived grammar of Bengal politics, Mamata Banerjee still carries a more credible emotional contract with the voter than the BJP does. The uploaded documents converge on the same thesis: TMC's social coalition, women-centred welfare, minority consolidation, booth-level embeddedness, Bengali identity narrative and Mamata's singular leadership still outweigh the BJP's campaign of corruption, law and order, polarisation and central power. But that same thesis carries a warning: if TMC wins a fourth term, it cannot continue with the older model of welfare plus local control. The next mandate must become a governance reset.

TMC is likely to win not because Bengal is free of anger, but because its welfare memory, social coalition, Bengali identity and Mamata Banerjee's personal connect still outweigh the BJP's opposition narrative.

The Welfare State as Political Memory

The first chapter of the story begins not in television studios but in kitchens, schoolbags, ration queues, hospital counters and bank passbooks. TMC's greatest strength is that welfare has become personal. Lakshmir Bhandar is not merely a scheme name printed in government advertisements. For more than two crore women, it is a recurring monthly recognition by the state. Kanyashree is not merely a scholarship scheme. It is a memory of the state telling a girl that her schooling matters. Swasthya Sathi is not merely a card. For families that have used it in moments of medical panic, it is evidence that the government can intervene when money is unavailable. Rupashree, Sabuj Sathi, Student Credit Card, Utkarsh Bangla, Duare Sarkar and related initiatives have together built a welfare ecosystem that reaches across life stages: school, college, health, marriage support, skilling, local certificates, grievance redressal and household cash.

The uploaded material places the scale of this welfare system at the centre of the election. Lakshmir Bhandar is reported to cover around 2.21 crore women, with large annual allocations and cumulative expenditure running into tens of thousands of crores. Kanyashree has crossed the one crore or near-one-crore beneficiary mark in different official and political references. Swasthya Sathi is described as covering crores of families or roughly eight to nine crore people, with over one crore hospitalisation or service beneficiaries. Sabuj Sathi has reached more than a crore students through bicycles. Duare Sarkar has delivered more than ten crore public services through lakhs of camps. These numbers matter because they are not abstract campaign claims to a poor household. They are proof that something has arrived.

This is why the BJP's promise of a larger monthly payment to women, including the pitch of Rs. 3,000 per month, faces a credibility problem. In election theory, future promise can defeat past delivery only if the challenger is trusted more than the incumbent. In Bengal, TMC can say, "We are already paying." BJP must say, "We will pay if elected." For an urban analyst, the difference may appear administrative. For a lower-income woman, it is existential. A guaranteed smaller flow can be more valuable than a larger uncertain one. In the political imagination of Bengal, TMC's welfare architecture has become a running tap; the BJP is offering a new pipeline whose water is yet to be tested.

Social Arithmetic: Minorities, Women and the Fear Factor

The second chapter is social arithmetic, but arithmetic in Bengal is never only arithmetic. Muslims constitute about 27 percent of West Bengal's population according to Census 2011, and in many districts and constituencies they are decisive. It would be analytically incorrect to claim that any community votes 100 percent in one direction. But the documents correctly emphasise that strong minority consolidation behind TMC remains one of the party's greatest advantages. Post-poll and political analyses after the 2024 Lok Sabha election suggested a very large Muslim preference for TMC. In 2026, that consolidation may sharpen further because of BJP's rhetoric around infiltration, Bangladeshis, Rohingyas, CAA, UCC and voter verification.

Here, BJP faces a paradox of its own making. The harder it speaks to one section of Hindu voters through suspicion of minorities, the more it consolidates Muslim voters behind TMC. The decision not to field Muslim candidates in the 2026 Assembly election, as noted in the uploaded documents, becomes symbolically meaningful in a state where minority representation is not merely arithmetic but also dignity. TMC's fielding of a significant number of Muslim candidates, and Congress fielding even more in some accounts, allows Mamata Banerjee to claim that she represents Bengal's social plurality while BJP represents a politics of exclusion.

Smaller minority-oriented parties such as AIMIM or ISF may try to fragment this vote, but the current climate makes TMC's counter-narrative powerful: do not split the vote when the larger threat is disenfranchisement and centralised majoritarianism. The uploaded drafts also treat controversies around splinter Muslim initiatives with caution, correctly distinguishing between allegation and proof. The political point, however, stands: where minority voters fear that vote division may help BJP, consolidation becomes a survival instinct rather than a party preference.

The third chapter is the Special Intensive Revision of the voter list, or SIR, which has become more than an administrative exercise. It has become an emotional wound. The uploaded documents present slightly different numerical formulations but converge on the political essence: the revision created deep anxiety among the poor, minorities, migrants, Dalits, Matuas, elderly voters and families with fragile documentation. Some accounts state that the electorate before draft publication was over 7.66 crore and the final roll came down to about 6.44 crore, with more than 60 lakh doubtful or pending cases under adjudication. The exact official mechanics may be contested, but the lived experience is clear: many families felt that the right to vote had become uncertain.

SIR: Administrative Revision as Democratic Anxiety

That uncertainty does not affect only the person whose name is missing. If one member of a family is deleted, doubtful or summoned into an adjudication process, the entire household feels insulted and threatened. If a grandfather's name remains but the grandson's disappears, the family does not interpret it as technical cleansing. It interprets it as democratic insecurity. If documents accepted earlier are suddenly treated as insufficient, the voter does not see software accuracy; the voter sees suspicion. TMC has converted this into a powerful argument: Bengal's poor, Bengal's minorities, Bengal's migrants and Bengal's ordinary people are being harassed in the name of cleansing voter rolls.

The BJP expected that voter-roll revision and citizenship politics would help it by sharpening the infiltrator narrative. But the documents argue that the fallout has not been so neat. Reports cited in the drafts suggest that a large share of excluded or affected people were Hindus, including lower-income Hindu households, Dalits and Matuas, even while specific constituencies also showed disproportionate minority impact. This complicates BJP's strategy. Instead of producing a clean Hindu-versus-Muslim polarisation, SIR may have produced a shared grievance across communities. For TMC, that is politically valuable because Mamata Banerjee can present herself as the defender of the voter, not only the defender of minorities.

The fourth chapter is Mamata herself. The TMC has scandals, unpopular local leaders, factional arrogance and accusations of syndicate culture. Yet many voters still distinguish between "Didi" and the local "dada." This distinction may appear illogical to critics, but it is politically real. Mamata Banerjee remains Bengal's most emotionally legible leader. Her cotton saree, rubber slippers, street protests, rough humour, impatience, anger, poetry, songs, injuries, hunger-strike memory and permanent posture of combat give her something that no BJP leader in Bengal has matched: a sense of being recognisably local, unmediated and personally invested.

Mamata Banerjee: The Singular Face of the Contest

The SIR controversy has allowed her to return to her strongest political role: protector of Bengal against Delhi. Every confrontation with the Election Commission, every court battle, every protest march, every slogan about Bengali dignity helps her become again what she was before 2011: a fighter against a larger power. The irony is that after fifteen years in government, she can still campaign as if she is fighting from the street. That is a rare political skill. Many incumbents become administrators; Mamata has remained agitator-in-chief.

Her gender is not incidental. TMC's welfare architecture has been deliberately feminised. Kanyashree speaks to girls, Lakshmir Bhandar to women, Rupashree to poorer families with daughters, self-help groups to rural economic networks, and panchayat representation to local female visibility. Mamata is not merely a woman chief minister; she is the symbolic centre of a women-facing political economy. BJP can and does attack TMC over women's safety, especially after Sandeshkhali and RG Kar. These attacks have force. But BJP has not built a comparable Bengal-specific women's economic architecture. That difference matters at the polling booth.

The fifth chapter is organisation. Bengal elections are not won only by speeches from helicopters. They are won through booths, para networks, clubs, panchayats, self-help groups, local grievance handlers, ration-card problem solvers, school contacts, hospital mediators, beneficiary lists and counting-room vigilance. The uploaded documents repeatedly emphasise that TMC's booth machine remains its hardest electoral weapon. The CPI(M) once had such embedded structure; today it does not. BJP has expanded since 2019, but expansion is not the same as embeddedness.

The Booth Machine and the Local Memory of Power

A TMC worker often knows who received Lakshmir Bhandar, whose health card was used, whose son migrated, whose daughter needs a scholarship, whose land dispute is pending, whose name may have been cut from the voter list, whose family is angry, and who must be persuaded before polling day. This knowledge is not always benign. It can become pressure, intimidation, cut money and local capture. But electorally, it is an information advantage. BJP may have central leaders, digital campaigns, money, Hindutva messaging and national media amplification. TMC has local memory.

This is why the party's pre-counting focus on agents, booth-level vigilance and constituency-level instructions matters. Elections in Bengal are not merely voting-day events; they are organisational wars from voter list to counting table. TMC understands that politics is not only mood but machinery. BJP has a machine too, but in many areas, especially South Bengal and rural belts where TMC controls much of the panchayat structure, the challenger still lacks the intimate everyday presence that turns anger into votes.

The sixth chapter is Bengali identity. BJP's "double engine" pitch has run into TMC's "Bengal versus outsider control" pitch. The outsider argument is sometimes dismissed as regional chauvinism, but in Bengal it taps into a long cultural memory: language, literature, food, festivals, refugee histories, syncretic traditions, rural folk cultures, urban bhadralok pride and suspicion of northern political templates. The controversies cited in the uploaded documents - Bengali being described in a Delhi Police communication as a "Bangladeshi language," Bengali-speaking migrant workers being treated as Bangladeshis in some BJP-ruled contexts, and food-policing anxieties around fish and meat - have given TMC symbolic fuel.

Bengali Identity Against the Outsider Frame

Bengal's cultural politics is complex because the same voter may worship Durga, eat fish, celebrate Eid with neighbours, visit a Jagannath temple, admire Netaji, recite Tagore, watch football and distrust communal policing. TMC has understood this better than BJP. Its support for Durga Puja committees, the Digha Jagannath temple project, and Hindu cultural events is not a shift to Hindutva; it is an attempt to prevent BJP from monopolising Hindu identity. The message is: Bengal can be deeply Hindu in cultural practice without becoming majoritarian in political temperament.

This soft religious patronage blunts the BJP's attempt to label TMC anti-Hindu. It tells Hindu voters that they do not need BJP to protect Durga Puja, temple devotion or Bengali Hindu culture. At the same time, TMC maintains its minority support by presenting Bengal's Hindu practice as plural, festive and local rather than exclusionary. This is a delicate balance, but so far it has worked well enough to limit BJP's statewide polarisation dividend.

The seventh chapter is the BJP's central weakness: it has not answered the question, "Who will run Bengal?" Narendra Modi remains BJP's biggest campaigner and most recognisable national brand. But a state election finally asks a state question. Modi will not sit in Nabanna. Amit Shah will not run district administration. BJP has strong Bengal leaders - Suvendu Adhikari, Dilip Ghosh, Sukanta Majumdar, Samik Bhattacharya and others - but the party has not projected a single undisputed chief ministerial face with the emotional clarity Mamata possesses.

Why BJP Falls Short

This leadership vacuum matters because anti-incumbency needs a destination. A voter angry with TMC must be able to imagine a government after TMC. The BJP has often offered anger but not enough local reassurance. Its leadership has appeared fragmented: Suvendu as combative opposition face, Dilip as original grassroots BJP voice, Sukanta or Samik as organisational heads, and the central leadership as the real authority. This creates reach but not emotional certainty. TMC has one answer: Mamata. BJP has a committee.

The Chandra Kumar Bose factor, as described in the uploaded documents, is symbolic but significant. When Netaji's grandnephew and a former BJP figure joins TMC while saying BJP does not understand Bengal's soul, it reinforces the cultural legitimacy problem. One leader's movement does not decide elections, but symbols matter in Bengal. Netaji, Tagore, Vivekananda, Nazrul and the wider Bengal renaissance are not ornamental references; they are part of political identity. If BJP appears unable to inhabit that symbolic world naturally, TMC's outsider narrative gains strength.

The eighth chapter is why BJP's polarisation strategy has a ceiling. Hindu consolidation has helped BJP in many states and in parts of Bengal. It has delivered support in North Bengal, border belts, urban pockets and Matua-influenced areas. But Bengal is not a blank slate. It has religious anxieties, but also a strong linguistic and cultural self-conception. It has refugee memories, but also fear of documentation harassment. It has Hindu pride, but also discomfort with being told that Bengali food, language and social practice are suspect. A hard communal pitch may energise some voters but alienate others.

The documents point out that BJP's rhetoric around infiltrators, Rohingyas and Bangladeshis may deepen minority consolidation and unsettle Bengali cultural moderates. It can also worry Matuas and other borderland communities if citizenship promises remain entangled in paperwork. The CAA pathway, once a strong BJP promise, becomes a double-edged sword when beneficiaries do not experience swift, dignified, guaranteed citizenship. If a voter expected recognition but instead feels scrutiny, the promise turns into anxiety.

North Bengal remains important for BJP, and TMC cannot take it lightly. The hills, tea gardens, tribal belts, Rajbanshi areas and border districts are not uniformly pro-TMC. But the documents suggest that BJP's earlier momentum there has faced strains: unresolved questions about a permanent political solution in Darjeeling, delayed Gorkha sub-tribe recognition, labour anxiety in tea gardens and jute sectors, and frustration in refugee and Matua belts. BJP may still win several seats in these zones, but pockets of strength are not the same as a statewide majority.

The Third Force and the Limits of Anti-Incumbency

The ninth chapter is the Left-Congress factor. In 2021, Bengal became almost bipolar: TMC versus BJP. Many anti-TMC voters shifted to BJP because it appeared the only party capable of defeating Mamata. In 2026, the opposition space is more fragmented. CPI(M) is trying to recover youth, jobs and constitutional politics. Congress has campaigned in minority and border districts such as Malda and Murshidabad. Even if the Left and Congress do not win many seats, their presence matters in close contests. A three to five percent anti-TMC vote split can defeat BJP's hopes in several constituencies.

This helps TMC structurally. Some voters who dislike TMC but fear BJP may return to the Left or Congress. Some educated urban voters angry over corruption, recruitment scams or RG Kar may not want to vote BJP. Some minorities may prefer Congress locally but still consolidate behind TMC where BJP is the main challenger. The result is that BJP's anti-incumbency pool is not fully consolidated. TMC benefits when opposition anger is morally loud but electorally divided.

The tenth chapter is development data and the argument against collapse. BJP has tried to present Bengal as lawless, jobless and economically broken. TMC's counter is that Bengal is not a Gujarat-style industrial state, but it is not an economic desert. The uploaded documents refer to growth in state domestic product since 2011, per capita GSDP estimates around Rs. 1.71 lakh for 2023-24, unemployment rates lower than national figures in cited PLFS/NITI-linked accounts, strong agricultural cropping intensity around 184 percent, and tourism strength, including West Bengal's high rank in foreign tourist visits in 2024 and the global visibility of Durga Puja after UNESCO recognition.

Development, Data and the Counter-Narrative to Collapse

The Kolkata safety data cited in the documents also complicates the BJP's narrative. NCRB 2023 reportedly placed Kolkata among the safest major Indian cities for cognisable offences and relatively lower among metros for crimes against women. This does not erase RG Kar, Sandeshkhali, political violence or local intimidation. It does, however, allow TMC to respond to blanket claims of total lawlessness. The more accurate description is mixed: Bengal has serious governance failures, but it also has functioning welfare, agriculture, tourism, cultural economy, MSMEs, services, migration-linked remittances and urban professional sectors.

TMC also uses the central-deprivation argument. Disputes over MGNREGS and other central funds have been converted into a Bengal-rights issue. BJP says funds were withheld because of corruption and misuse; TMC says Delhi is denying Bengal its due. In a federal state with strong linguistic identity, this grievance resonates. It allows TMC to present welfare stress not only as a state-capacity problem but as central punishment. Whether every claim is accepted or not, the emotional frame is effective: Delhi is unfair, Didi is fighting.

And yet, the eleventh chapter is the most important one: TMC's vulnerabilities are real. The school jobs scam has damaged public trust deeply. It struck at the heart of educated Bengal's moral economy: the belief that study, merit and public recruitment can still produce dignity. When thousands of appointments are cancelled, when courts intervene, when tainted lists are discussed, and when genuine candidates feel cheated, the wound goes beyond one department. It tells young people that the system is rigged. If TMC wins, transparent recruitment must be its first governance reset.

The Real Anger Against TMC

The second vulnerability is syndicate raj. TMC's local embeddedness wins elections, but it can also become coercive control over construction, contracts, markets, clubs, small businesses, permissions and neighbourhood life. Cut money, intimidation, party-linked extortion and local arrogance may not operate everywhere, but where they do, they create intense resentment. This is the most dangerous contradiction in the TMC model: the same cadre who helps a beneficiary access welfare can also dominate the same family through fear. A fourth-term government cannot survive long-term if it protects such networks.

The third vulnerability is women's dignity. Sandeshkhali and RG Kar have created moral anger that no serious analysis can minimise. BJP may politicise these issues, but politicisation does not make the underlying pain false. For a party led by India's most prominent woman chief minister, and for a party whose electoral base rests heavily on women, this is an existential warning. TMC cannot celebrate Lakshmir Bhandar and tolerate the humiliation, insecurity or silencing of women by local strongmen, hospital systems, police indifference or party networks.

The fourth vulnerability is youth employment. Official unemployment rates may not be catastrophic in the cited data, but the deeper issue is quality employment. Too many young Bengalis depend on migration, low-paid service work, coaching-centre uncertainty, political brokerage, informal retail, delivery work, tuition, small gigs or repeated exam preparation. Welfare protects the poor, but jobs give dignity to the young. If TMC's next mandate does not become a jobs mandate, BJP or another opposition will eventually find a stronger opening.

The fifth vulnerability is education. Declining enrolment, school rationalisation debates, teacher vacancies, one-teacher schools, learning deficits and recruitment scandals together create a dangerous crisis. Bengal's political culture has always placed high value on education. If public education loses credibility, TMC loses a part of Bengal's soul. The next government must fill vacancies, create a credible recruitment calendar, protect viable rural schools, merge only where educationally justified, provide transport, digitise attendance, improve foundational learning and rebuild trust with teachers and parents.

This is why TMC's likely victory must become a governance reset. The 2011 model was built around ending Left rule, welfare expansion, street-fighter charisma, local party control and Bengali pride. The 2026 model must be different. It must be built around clean delivery, accountable administration, investment, productive welfare, school revival, transparent recruitment, women's safety, digital governance, MSME growth, skilling and urban renewal. The party cannot assume that because welfare has won this election, welfare alone will win the next one.

The Governance Reset Bengal Now Needs

The first reset should be from welfare to productive welfare. Lakshmir Bhandar, Kanyashree, Rupashree, Swasthya Sathi and Duare Sarkar must continue, but they must be connected to livelihoods. Every woman beneficiary who wants income should have access to SHG strengthening, Udyam registration, bank credit, digital payment training, e-commerce onboarding, local procurement opportunities and skill certification. Bengal should launch a Micro and Nano Enterprise Mission that links one crore women and youth to livelihood pathways, creates lakhs of nano enterprises in the first two years, and builds sector clusters in food processing, fishery, textiles, crafts, repair services, beauty and wellness, rural tourism, digital work, green products and local logistics.

The second reset should be recruitment credibility. Bengal needs an independent, technology-backed, court-proof recruitment architecture for teachers, police, health workers, clerks, engineers and local government staff. Every exam should have secure digital audit trails, public answer keys, time-bound grievance windows, third-party panel audits, annual vacancy calendars and strict punishment for political interference. This is not merely administrative reform. It is the moral repair of the state.

The third reset should be an anti-syndicate governance design. Speeches will not end syndicates; systems will. The government should introduce transparent e-tendering for smaller thresholds, online construction permissions, ward-level anti-extortion helplines, public dashboards of local contracts, strict policing of party-linked coercion, district ombudsmen for small business harassment and time-bound service delivery guarantees. The leadership must make visible examples of its own cadres. Without that, anti-incumbency will deepen beneath the surface.

The fourth reset should be a Women's Dignity and Safety Compact. Every police station should have functional women's help desks, trained personnel and accountability for refusal to register complaints. Sexual violence and political intimidation cases should be fast-tracked. There should be safe transport and lighting audits in towns, campuses, hospitals, haats and rural roads. Party functionaries facing credible prima facie allegations of violence against women should be suspended or expelled pending investigation. Survivor support must include compensation, counselling, relocation assistance where necessary and witness protection. This is not a public relations issue; it is the foundation of TMC's moral legitimacy.

The fifth reset should be an employment and investment compact suited to Bengal's own strengths. Bengal need not copy Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka or Telangana, but it must attract capital. Its route should be distributed productivity: IT and fintech in Kolkata, New Town, Siliguri, Durgapur-Asansol and Kharagpur; biotech and health-tech around Kolkata and Kalyani; agro-processing for rice, fish, fruit, vegetables, dairy and flowers; jute modernisation and technical textiles; engineering revival in Howrah and Durgapur-Asansol; logistics linked to ports and freight corridors; and tourism circuits around Durga Puja, Sundarbans, Darjeeling, Dooars, Murshidabad, Bishnupur and coastal Bengal. Bengal's advantage is culture plus people plus services plus agriculture plus small enterprise. The task is to make that high-productivity.

The sixth reset should be fiscal and administrative honesty. Welfare promises must be funded through better revenue collection, GST analytics, leak detection, property registration reform, mining and excise transparency, procurement efficiency, central dues litigation where justified, and disciplined borrowing. A state cannot build dignity only through schemes if it does not build fiscal capacity. Welfare without productivity becomes stress. Productivity without welfare becomes exclusion. Bengal needs both.

The seventh reset should be civic governance. Kolkata and Bengal's towns need cleaner drainage, waste management, safer transport, footpath discipline, hawker policy, flood resilience, heritage renewal, better public toilets, affordable rental housing and digital municipal services. Rural Bengal needs roads, irrigation, drinking water, school transport, health sub-centres, market access and climate resilience, especially in vulnerable regions such as the Sundarbans. The next phase of governance must be visible not only in bank accounts but also in streets, schools, hospitals and markets.

The final chapter, therefore, is not simply "TMC will win." It is "TMC will win, but victory will not be enough." BJP is likely to fall short because it has not overcome Mamata's leadership advantage, TMC's welfare memory, minority consolidation, women's support, booth organisation, Bengali identity politics, SIR-induced anxiety, opposition vote fragmentation and its own absence of a trusted local chief ministerial face. But TMC's win will be meaningful only if it treats the mandate as a warning wrapped in approval.

Conclusion: Victory as Responsibility

Bengal is not voting for perfection. It is choosing between two imperfect futures. One is a welfare-delivery state with corruption, local coercion and fatigue, but also familiarity, cultural rootedness and household-level benefits. The other is a powerful national party with central resources and ideological force, but still an under-specified Bengal model, unresolved leadership, cultural legitimacy problems and polarisation ceilings. In that comparison, Mamata Banerjee and TMC remain ahead.

Yet the future will not be kind to complacency. The voter who accepts Lakshmir Bhandar today may demand jobs for her son tomorrow. The girl who benefited from Kanyashree may demand a fair teacher recruitment exam. The family that used Swasthya Sathi may demand a safer hospital. The rural voter who trusts Didi against Delhi may demand protection against the local party strongman. The urban voter who rejects BJP's cultural aggression may still demand clean municipal governance. The minority voter who consolidates out of fear may eventually demand development beyond protection.

That is the true Bengal story of 2026. TMC's advantage is real because it is layered: welfare, women, minorities, Mamata, organisation, identity and opposition weakness. BJP's deficit is real because it is structural: no single Bengal face, uncertain welfare credibility, over-reliance on polarisation, outsider optics, fragmented local leadership and incomplete social trust. But TMC's next challenge is larger than defeating BJP. It must defeat the weaknesses within its own model.

If Mamata Banerjee wins again, she will not merely have retained power. She will have received one of the last great opportunities to transform Bengal's welfare state into a clean, productive, safe, employment-generating and culturally confident development state. The mandate will say that Bengal still trusts Didi more than Delhi. The responsibility will be to prove that Didi's Bengal can now trust institutions more than intermediaries, jobs more than patronage, justice more than party control, and governance more than election machinery. That is the reset Bengal will need after the victory.        

The author is a known academic, Pro Vice Chancellor of a Bengal based university, and Vice President of Global Media Education Council.

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The fires that consumed Nepal’s Singha Durbar government complex in September 2025 did more than just gut a building; they incinerated a political order that had stood, precariously, for nearly two decades. What began as a youth-led outcry against a sweeping social media ban spiralled into the most violent national upheaval in a generation, toppling a government and forcing a discredited political class from power. This was not just a riot; it was a rupture.

The crisis, born of the deep-seated frustration of a generation denied a future, has plunged Nepal into profound uncertainty. Yet, within this trauma lies a generational opportunity. The collapse of a sclerotic and corrupt system has cleared the space for a fundamental reimagining of the Nepali state and its relationship with its citizens. With the respected former Chief Justice Sushila Karki now at the helm of an interim government, the nation stands at a critical juncture. This moment must not be wasted on a simple restoration of the old system with new faces. Instead, it must be seized to break decisively from the failed "Remittance-Patronage" model of the past and embark on a bold, new trajectory.

Anatomy of a Generational Revolt

The spark was the government's abrupt ban on 26 major social media platforms, including Facebook and X (formerly Twitter). Officially, it was about regulatory compliance. To the public, it was a crude attempt to silence dissent. For Nepal’s youth, it was an assault on their only world. In a nation where nearly two million citizens work abroad, their remittances forming a third of the GDP, these apps were the vital, low-cost lifelines connecting families. They were also a burgeoning marketplace for young entrepreneurs. The ban was not just censorship; it was an economic and social amputation.

The state’s heavy-handed response to peaceful protests—leaving dozens dead and over a thousand injured—was the accelerant. Anger turned to rage, and the revolt went national. But the fuel for this fire had been gathering for years, crystallized by a potent, viral narrative: the "Nepo Kid" campaign. Months before the protests, TikTok videos began systematically exposing the opulent lifestyles of the children of politicians and their cronies. Luxury cars and foreign holidays were juxtaposed with the grim reality for most Nepali youth: chronic unemployment and forced migration for menial jobs abroad. In a country with a per capita income of around $1,400, this flaunting of wealth, widely seen as the fruit of corruption, made the abstract concept of "elite capture" infuriatingly personal.

The movement was a distinctly 21st-century phenomenon. Inspired by recent youth-led uprisings in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, it was leaderless, decentralized, and organized organically online with hashtags like #EnoughIsEnough. The slogans on the streets—"Shut down corruption and not social media," "No More Nepo Babies"—were a wholesale rejection of the entire political class that had played a game of musical chairs with power since the monarchy was abolished in 2008.

The Rot Within: A State Built on Exile and Impunity

The 2025 crisis was a systemic failure, its roots deeply embedded in the flawed political and economic model established after the 2006 peace accord. The post-conflict settlement created what can be termed a "Remittance-Patronage State"—an unstable model where mass youth out-migration served as a political safety valve. The resulting flow of money was not invested in national development but managed through political patronage networks that enriched a small elite.

For over a decade, Nepal’s economy has been predicated not on building domestic industry, but on exporting its people. In the 2024-25 fiscal year alone, over 839,000 labor exit permits were issued. This inflow of foreign currency fueled a consumption-and-import boom, benefiting those in power while hollowing out the country's productive capacity. The social cost has been immense, with an "absent population" leading to abandoned villages and a fraying social fabric.

The most direct consequence is a debilitating youth unemployment crisis, with rates hovering around 20%. Nepal’s education system, with its outdated curricula, produces graduates who are functionally unemployable, creating a tragic skills mismatch. For those who do find work, over 90% are in the informal economy, defined by low wages, no security, and no future.

This economic dysfunction is the deliberate outcome of a political system built on elite capture and a foundational culture of impunity. The failure to deliver transitional justice for the atrocities of the 1996-2006 Maoist insurgency was the state's original sin. By prioritizing political compromise over accountability, it sent a clear message that power provides immunity from the rule of law. The systemic corruption that fuelled the 2025 protests is a direct continuation of this legacy. Tens of thousands of complaints of serious human rights violations remain unaddressed, a lingering shadow that has undermined faith in all state institutions.

A Fork in the Road: Lessons from Sri Lanka and Rwanda

As Nepal charts its course, the experiences of two other nations offer powerful, contrasting lessons. Sri Lanka’s recent economic collapse is a cautionary tale. A toxic cocktail of populist policies, massive tax cuts, and weak governance led to an economic implosion and a popular uprising in 2022. Its recovery has been a painful, IMF-dictated course of austerity, restoring macroeconomic stability at a huge social cost, with poverty nearly doubling. The key lessons for Nepal are stark: fiscal discipline is non-negotiable, and independent institutions like a central bank are a critical bulwark against political profligacy.

In sharp contrast, Rwanda offers an inspirational lesson in national transformation. After the 1994 genocide destroyed its social and economic fabric, Rwanda embarked on an ambitious state-building project guided by a long-term national plan, "Vision 2020." It embraced a "developmental state" model, building a strong, capable bureaucracy to guide the economy, pursuing a zero-tolerance policy on corruption, and strategically attracting investment. Crucially, it understood that security and national reconciliation were the non-negotiable foundations upon which economic prosperity had to be built. The Rwandan renaissance demonstrates the power of a unifying national vision and a capable state to heal a nation and drive development.

Nepal now faces a choice between these two paths: a minimalist, reactive course correction or a fundamental, proactive national transformation.

A Blueprint for a New Nepal

The path forward requires an integrated, three-pillar strategy to transform Nepal from a "Remittance-Patronage State" into a modern, productive, and inclusive "Developmental State."

1. Forging a New National Purpose: The interim government’s mandate cannot simply be to be "not corrupt." Integrity is the entry ticket to legitimacy, but Nepal needs a positive, forward-looking vision. Drawing from the Rwandan experience, it should initiate a broad, nationwide consultative process to draft a "Nepal Vision 2050." This new social contract must be anchored in "National Developmentalism"—a pragmatic ideology focused on building a productive, innovative, and globally competitive economy. This also means decisively addressing the unfinished business of the Maoist conflict. The transitional justice process must be revitalized, pairing credible, top-down investigations with bottom-up, community-led reconciliation initiatives to finally heal the nation's wounds and restore faith in the rule of law.

2. An Economic Paradigm Shift: To tackle the youth employment crisis, Nepal must move from exporting labour to creating opportunity at home. This requires a national strategy that links industrial policy with human capital development. The state must actively promote investment in labour-intensive sectors like agro-processing, light manufacturing, and sustainable tourism. Simultaneously, it must radically overhaul its vocational training system to make it demand-driven and responsive to the needs of the private sector. Nepal can scale up proven local models, such as the "Employment Fund," whose results-based financing model achieved a 90% employment rate for its graduates. Fostering an entrepreneurial ecosystem through education, access to finance, and one-stop support hubs is also essential.

3. Rebuilding Trust: The success of any reform agenda hinges on restoring the shattered confidence of both Nepali citizens and the international community. The appointment of Sushila Karki, a figure of unimpeachable integrity, is a powerful first step. This moral authority must be translated into immediate, concrete actions: radical transparency measures, independent audits of state enterprises, and a depoliticized anti-corruption commission. By embedding integrity into its core economic value proposition, Nepal can attract the responsible, long-term investment needed to fuel its development, shifting the international conversation from aid to partnership, from fragility to opportunity.

The Engine of Transition

This ambitious agenda cannot be implemented by a transitional government alone. To anchor the reform process and provide essential expertise, Nepal needs a new institutional mechanism: a "Transition Support Group." Composed of the nation's leading independent think tanks, public intellectuals, and trusted civil society organizations, this body would operate as a non-partisan, technocratic engine. Its mandate would be to provide evidence-based policy advice, facilitate the national dialogue for Vision 2050, and act as an independent watchdog to ensure accountability. It would institutionalize the very spirit of the Gen Z movement—collaborative, evidence-based, and demanding of transparency—channelling the revolutionary energy of the streets into the patient work of building a better state.

The path to a "New Nepal" will be long and fraught with challenges. It will require sustained political will, active citizen participation, and steadfast international support. The sacrifices made on the streets of Kathmandu demand nothing less. The crisis has created a clear mandate for profound change. It is now up to this generation of Nepalis to build a future where the promise of peace, dignity, and prosperity is finally realized for all.

This article is by Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury, a regular writer and commentator on international affairs.

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The 2024 Indian general elections altered the landscape of Indian politics in a seismic way. While the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) retained power through the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), its own tally of 240 seats fell short of the halfway mark—a stark contrast to its past two resounding mandates. On the other side, the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) secured 234 seats, signalling a rejuvenated opposition and the beginning of a new democratic contest. The outcome was not a ringing endorsement of the incumbent but a clear signal of voter recalibration.  

2029 is no longer a distant dream for the opposition. It is a winnable challenge. But the road to revival demands more than resistance—it calls for reinvention, institutional unity, and a credible, inclusive national alternative. The task is not simply to oppose the government but to present a coherent and hopeful vision for India's future, capable of neutralizing the incumbent's formidable financial, organizational, and institutional advantages.  

A Reinvigorated Congress: From Dynasty to Democracy

The Congress Party, with its pan-India footprint and improved 2024 performance of 99 seats and a 21.4% vote share, must embrace its role as the fulcrum of the opposition alliance. But this leadership role hinges on transformation. Internal democracy must be more than symbolism—it must be institutionalized. The perception of a top-down, dynastic culture has long been the party's primary vulnerability. To credibly lead an alliance dedicated to defending democracy, the Congress must first become demonstrably democratic itself.  

Transparent organizational elections, from the block level to the Congress Working Committee, are essential not only to deflect dynasty criticisms but also to rebuild moral credibility and unearth a new generation of energetic, mass-based leaders. A renewed Congress can no longer afford to act like a ‘first among all’—it must lead as a "first among equals," acknowledging and accommodating the strengths of key regional allies like the Samajwadi Party, DMK, and AITMC, whose contributions were pivotal to the INDIA bloc's 2024 success.  

INDIA 2.0: From Electoral Arrangement to Institutional Coalition

The INDIA bloc must evolve from a tactical alliance into a permanent institutional force, ideally formalized by 2025. The fragility of ad-hoc arrangements is already apparent, with senior leaders expressing doubts about the bloc's future and some partners declaring the alliance was limited to the Lok Sabha polls. A last-minute coalition is a recipe for mistrust and public confusion. This transformation demands a federal and inclusive architecture with an Apex Steering Committee for strategic decisions, Coordination Committees for seat-sharing and campaign planning, a Common Secretariat for logistics, and a Joint Communication Cell to ensure message discipline.  

Data-driven seat-sharing, based on the 2024 performance and independent surveys, must replace the chaotic ad-hocism that has plagued past efforts. More critically, all intervening state assembly elections must be fought together. This is not merely about winning individual states; it is a vital battle for the national narrative, essential for denying the BJP regional victories and sustaining the momentum gained in 2024.  

Caste Census: Social Justice as Economic Reform

A nationwide socio-economic caste census must become the moral and political nucleus of the INDIA bloc’s agenda. The BJP may brand this as divisive, but the data—from Bihar to Telangana—prove otherwise: caste remains a fundamental determinant of economic deprivation. The Bihar survey revealed that Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and Extremely Backward Classes (EBCs) form over 63% of the state's population, with poverty disproportionately high among Scheduled Castes and Tribes.  

By scientifically mapping backwardness through a 'Composite Backwardness Index' modelled on Telangana's pioneering effort, the opposition can reimagine affirmative action as data-led governance. This approach moves beyond population numbers to create a nuanced, data-driven measure of disadvantage. Linking this census to a Minimum Income Guarantee program will ensure benefits reach the most deprived—making welfare targeted, affordable, and morally compelling.  

Economic Reboot: Relief, Jobs, and Equity

The opposition’s economic vision must be built on three pillars: relief, jobs, and equity. A bold proposal to make annual incomes up to ₹9 lakh completely tax-exempt directly addresses the salaried class’s frustration with perceived “tax terrorism”. Simplifying the convoluted Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime to a rationalized three-tier system would help small businesses and improve compliance.  

Furthermore, the crisis of unemployment, with rates nearing 25% in states like Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, must be confronted head-on through filling government vacancies, launching entrepreneurship schemes, and reviewing the new labour codes to enhance job security. While headline inflation may seem moderate, the opposition must articulate a grounded economic message that focuses on the persistent high cost of living and offers a new direction prioritizing relief, fairness, and opportunity for all.  

Human Capital Mission: 24% for the People

A truly game-changing commitment would be to allocate 8% of the central budget each to Education, Health, and Transport-Mobility. This is not just a promise—it is a fundamental re-prioritization of national development. Such an investment would represent a more than threefold increase over current allocations for education and a fourfold increase for health, empowering the National Education Policy with actual implementation muscle, modernizing healthcare delivery, and rejuvenating core infrastructure like Indian Railways. This "National Human Capital and Infrastructure Mission" reframes welfare as a strategic investment, laying the foundation for a productive, healthy, and mobile India capable of achieving its goal of becoming a developed nation.  

Constitutional Patriotism: Reclaiming the Republic

The INDIA alliance must promise to restore the institutional integrity of India’s Republic. This begins with electoral transparency by pushing for increased VVPAT audits to restore public trust in EVMs, which has been a persistent concern despite the Supreme Court rejecting pleas for 100% verification. With India ranked a dismal 151st out of 180 countries in the World Press Freedom Index, the opposition must commit to dismantling media monopolies and protecting journalists.  

The justice system itself shows a governance deficit, with the India Justice Report 2025 highlighting chronic court vacancies, under-staffed police forces, and dangerously overcrowded prisons. Fixing these systemic flaws is not optional—it is existential to democracy. Federalism and secularism must become non-negotiables. The INDIA bloc must become not just an electoral coalition, but a constitutional movement.  

Winning the Narrative: From WhatsApp to the Working Class

The opposition’s Achilles' heel has been its messaging. That must end. A multi-tiered communication strategy should include a unified, emotionally resonant national slogan and a modern digital war room with a 24/7 disinformation counter-cell, data analytics unit, and influencer network to match the BJP's prowess. The messaging must be segmented and tailored to specific demographics—from a firm commitment to the 33% women's reservation for women voters to MSP guarantees for farmers and job security for the youth. Message discipline must finally match message diversity.  

A Principled Foreign Policy: From Optics to Autonomy

The INDIA bloc must restore strategic autonomy to Indian foreign policy, moving beyond flashy optics and transactional alliances. Its core tenets must be rebuilding "Neighbourhood First" diplomacy, maintaining firmness on China while fostering friendship with all global blocs, and linking domestic economic credibility with a stable rupee and strong global standing. By championing multilateralism and reforms in global governance, India can reclaim its role as a responsible, balanced leader of the Global South.  

Conclusion: A Coalition, A Constitution, A Country to Win

2024 was not the end of BJP dominance. It was the beginning of Indian democracy’s rebalancing. A reinvigorated Congress, a united INDIA bloc, and a transformative vision for social justice, economic revival, institutional renewal, and narrative control can together make 2029 a moment of democratic renewal. But this vision demands discipline, accommodation, and boldness. Seat-sharing must be pragmatic. Messaging must be sharp. Reforms must be real. The INDIA bloc must not merely oppose—it must offer a compelling alternative. 2029 is not a coronation for anyone. It is an open contest. The future belongs to those who prepare for it. And for the Indian Opposition, the time to prepare is now.

Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury is a known commentator and media academic.

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By Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury

In my recent article on creative careers and their learning, I have argued that the time for creative careers as a mainstream career choice for the Indian youths has now come decidedly. Questions were raised as to how these careers and their options will shape up in times of the ongoing digital-AI tsunami in this domain. I argue further that the possibilities have actually multiplied for the quality content creators, technicians and the creative economy business professionals, albeit the challenges. 

The Creative Economy

We must once again define this sector for clarity of understanding. 

The creative economy encompasses a broad spectrum of industries rooted in individual creativity, skill, and talent, with the potential for wealth and job creation through the generation and exploitation of intellectual property. These industries are diverse, ranging from traditional forms of artistic expression to cutting-edge digital endeavours. In India, this landscape includes sectors such as advertising, architecture, arts and crafts, design, fashion, film, video, photography, music, performing arts, publishing, research & development, software, computer games, electronic publishing, and TV/radio. Key sectors within the Indian creative economy showcase the nation's rich cultural heritage and its growing prowess in modern creative fields. Film and entertainment, anchored by Bollywood—the world's largest film industry by volume—along with vibrant regional cinema and the expanding influence of over-the-top (OTT) platforms, represent a significant segment. Fashion and textiles are renowned for their fusion of traditional craftsmanship and contemporary design, with Indian designers gaining international recognition and the textile industry serving as a major exporter. Visual arts and crafts thrive with a vibrant art scene, including globally recognized contemporary artists and a wealth of traditional art forms integral to rural economies. The gaming and digital media sector is experiencing rapid growth, driven by mobile gaming and the rise of content creators on platforms like YouTube and Instagram. India also boasts a robust publishing industry producing literature in numerous languages, with Indian authors achieving worldwide acclaim. The creative economy contributes significantly to India's economic output, accounting for an estimated INR 50,000 crore (US $6.14 billion) in 2019-20 and now standing as a USD 30 billion industry. Furthermore, India holds considerable export potential in both creative goods and services. The Indian creative economy's multifaceted nature, encompassing both established and emerging sectors, indicates the varied ways in which digital and AI-ML technologies are poised to make a substantial impact.   

The Digital-AI Tsunami Herein:

From Instagram Reels to YouTube Shorts, Canva to CapCut, Indian creators from the heart of Malda to the bustle of Mumbai are making content with zero legacy, often with just a smartphone. Algorithms can now push your poem, sketch, or music video to a million in a day—if it's compelling enough. A case in point is Shivani Bafna, a dancer and content creator, built a full-fledged personal brand out of Bollywood dance, mental health storytelling, and US-India lifestyle vlogging, thanks to the reach of social platforms and intelligent recommendation engines.

AI is not just about ChatGPT writing poems or Midjourney designing logos. It’s about creative acceleration. For the writers, GrammarlyGO, Jasper, and ChatGPT help ideate faster, create drafts, adapt tone and even localize. For the designers, Adobe Firefly, DALL·E, and Runway ML generate mock-ups, mood-boards, and campaign visuals in seconds. For the filmmakers, Descript and Pictory.ai allow rapid, AI-driven editing and subtitling. For the musicians, tools like AIVA and Amper create AI-assisted compositions for commercials and background scores. Tars, an Indian no-code platform using conversational AI, helps brands build storytelling chatbots that act as customer journey companions—designed by creative technologists.

Event creative learning is becoming smarter, faster and wider. AI-powered platforms are revolutionizing learning pathways. Skill development apps like FrontRow, Stage, and SkillShare (some India-based) bring experts directly to aspirants in Tier 2-3 cities. Immersive AR-VR labs in creative schools are helping students “experience design” before doing it. Bhavan’s MSEED Mumbai, for instance, is integrating XR tools into storytelling and event design curricula, enabling students to simulate stage shows, fashion events, or ad campaigns virtually.

AI and ML technologies are automating repetitive tasks in design, such as the resizing of images, correction of colours, and optimization of layouts. This allows graphic designers and other visual artists to focus on more complex and imaginative aspects of their work. Content creation processes are also being streamlined, with AI algorithms assisting in tasks like video editing, proofreading, and even the generation of advertising copy. In media production, AI is accelerating workflows in post-production by enhancing contrast, adjusting colouring, and improving the resolution of imagery. For example, AI-powered tools like Luminar are used for sophisticated photo editing, and composers are leveraging AI music composition tools to generate original soundtracks more easily. This increase in efficiency allows creative professionals in India to produce a higher volume of work with greater speed, ultimately enhancing their productivity.   

AI-ML algorithms are enabling highly personalized experiences for consumers of creative content in India. Content recommendation systems on media platforms like Spotify and Apple Music suggest songs based on individual listening patterns, while OTT platforms like Amazon and Netflix recommend movies and shows based on viewing history. In marketing and advertising, AI analyses consumer behaviour and preferences to deliver more targeted and personalized campaigns. Within design, AI can analyse customer demographics and past interactions to provide tailored recommendations, allowing designers to create content that resonates more effectively with specific audience segments. This ability to deliver hyper-personalized experiences across various touchpoints enhances customer satisfaction and engagement.  

AI-ML technologies offer powerful tools for analysing audience behaviour and preferences in India. By scrutinizing vast amounts of data from social media and other digital platforms, AI algorithms can identify trends and provide insights into what resonates with specific demographics. This allows for enhanced targeting of advertisements and marketing campaigns, ensuring that content reaches the right audience at the right time. Data-driven insights derived from AI analysis also inform content creation and distribution strategies, enabling businesses to refine their approaches for maximum impact. For instance, AI can identify highly specialized groups of users, allowing for more focused and effective marketing efforts.   

The adoption of AI-ML in India's creative industries can lead to significant cost reductions by automating tasks that previously required large teams or specialized personnel. Furthermore, the increasing availability of affordable digital tools and AI-powered platforms is lowering the entry barriers for individual creators, making it more feasible to pursue creative careers. Government-backed initiatives, such as the proposed National Creative Cloud Platform, aim to further democratize access to expensive creative software and cloud computing resources, enabling smaller studios and startups to compete more effectively. This increased accessibility fosters a more inclusive and vibrant creative ecosystem across the country.   

AI-ML technologies offer significant advantages in bridging language barriers within India's diverse linguistic landscape. AI tools can facilitate multilingual content creation and translation, enabling creative professionals to reach wider audiences across different regions. Automated journalism systems are now capable of producing news stories in multiple languages, catering to the diverse linguistic needs of the Indian population.

Challenges & Cautions in the Age of AI:

But then the challenges are galore in this emerging phenomenon. The first is the debate on authenticity versus algorithm. AI can help you create—but can also flood the market with mediocre, templated content. The challenge? Standing out with soul. When AI generates hundreds of visuals or scripts, human intuition, emotional layering, and originality will define quality. The cautionary tale here is that several digital creators have been flagged for “deepfake influencers” or overuse of AI-generated art without human essence. Audiences are quick to call out what feels fake.

Then there is the issue of job displacement and role mutation. Traditional roles—like photo editors, script assistants, illustrators—are being disrupted. Instead, new roles are emerging, like the prompt engineer, AI-curated content specialist, and creative technologist. Creative careers are shifting from "doing" to "directing the doing." According to a 2024 NASSCOM report, over 40% of creative media professionals in India will need upskilling in AI and data tools by 2027. That is the only way to be relevant in the market, apart from keeping authenticity and originality of content alive. 

Then there are the ethical & legal grey zones. Who owns AI-generated art? Ghibli style art flooding the social media is a fit case in this debate. Algorithmic bias, where AI models inherit biases from their training data, can lead to unfair or discriminatory outcomes in content creation and design. Issues related to copyright and intellectual property become more complex when dealing with AI-generated designs and content, often leading to disputes and legal uncertainties. Furthermore, the potential for AI to be used in creating and spreading misinformation and deepfakes poses a serious challenge to the integrity of media and communication. Careful regulation and ethical guidelines are essential to address these emerging risks. What if AI copies a copyrighted melody which it is doing left, right and centre? India’s legal framework is still evolving. Creative professionals need tech-literacy and legal awareness as core career skills now.

While AI-ML tools can augment creativity, they currently lack the nuanced understanding of human emotion, empathy, and the ability to inject genuine human touch into creative work. There is a concern that over-reliance on AI could lead to a homogenization of design aesthetics, resulting in a lack of originality and distinctiveness in creative outputs. For instance, some argue that AI-generated art, while technically proficient, may lack the soul and emotional depth that characterizes human artistic expression.

India’s Response: Promising Moves on Ground

Education gets future-ready. NID Ahmedabad is collaborating with tech partners to explore AI in textile and visual design. Whistling Woods International has launched courses on Virtual Production & AI in Filmmaking. MSEED, the new-age creative management institute in the Bhavan’s campus of Mumbai, emphasizes AI tools in communication, design, and entertainment education.

Then there are startups powering creative-AI. Gan.ai, a video personalization platform, allows creators to make multiple versions of a video with just one shoot. Beatoven.ai lets creators generate royalty-free background scores using AI for podcasts, films, and reels. Animeta, a creator economy tech platform, supports Indian influencers with AI-driven performance analytics.

There is AI-enhanced artistry like that of the Mumbai Art Collective which uses MidJourney and Stable Diffusion to reimagine Raja Ravi Varma’s paintings in AR, attracting younger audiences. There is the Carnatic Music synthesis, in which Chennai’s A.R. Rahman Foundation trains AI models on M.S. Subbulakshmi’s recordings to generate new raga-based compositions. There also is the collaborative creativity. AI Scriptwriting Assistants are rising. Platforms like Scrite analyse box-office data to suggest plot tweaks for regional cinema, as seen in the Telugu blockbuster Pushpa 2. There are Virtual Productions as well. YRF Studios uses Unreal Engine’s AI to create real-time backgrounds, cutting VFX costs by 40% for films like Pathaan.

We also have a rising trend of inclusive Design for the dfferently-abled creators. Bengaluru’ Inclusive Minds Lab employs AI voice-to-text tools to help dyslexic writers publish novels, such as the bestselling Whispers of the Silent Mind.

There is a distinct state & industry push visible. The AVGC (Animation, Visual Effects, Gaming, Comics) Task Force set up by the Government of India is exploring AI-led innovation zones. FICCI Frames 2025 spotlighted AI-Driven Storytelling as its central theme, with focus on ethical creative innovation.

Notable Indian initiatives also include the Digital India Bhashini that supports AI-driven translation for 22 languages, enabling Tamil poets to collaborate with Punjabi illustrators on cross-cultural comics. IIT Bombay-Ministry of Culture Partnership is digitizing 10,000+ folk art pieces using AI, creating a marketplace for artisans. FICCI Frames Accelerator is funding AI startups like DeepReel, which automates video editing for small YouTubers.

The Road Ahead: A Human-Tech Collaboration: 5^th Generation Technology:

Creative careers are no longer only about performance, design, or storytelling—they’re about transmedia fluency: How you move across formats, scale through tech, and create immersive impact. Herein lies the future possibilities of the master story-tellers, creative economy technicians and business professionals. 

The new creative genius is part artist, part technologist, part entrepreneur. To thrive, they are learning AI tools, but leading with human insight. They are understanding platforms, but focussing on purpose. They are adapting to change, but never abandoning their voice.

Digital platforms are democratizing access to creative education in India, breaking down geographical and socioeconomic barriers. Online courses and learning platforms such as Udemy, Coursera, Skillshare, and Alison offer a vast array of digital art courses, making learning more affordable and convenient. Indian platforms like Hunar Online Course provide government-certified courses in fashion, food, and beauty, often available in regional languages, reaching a wider audience. Institutions like Himanshu Art Institute and Kamal Art Institute offer online classes in fine arts, painting, drawing, and crafts, catering to various age groups and skill levels. Platforms like Rooftop and The Hobby Tribe focus on Indian art forms and various hobbies, respectively, offering workshops and courses online. The Asian Institute of Design (AID) provides degree and diploma courses in digital art, animation, and game programming. This widespread availability of online learning resources is significantly increasing the accessibility of creative education across India. The National Educational Technology Forum (NETF), proposed under the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, aims to further enhance this by facilitating the free exchange of ideas on digitization and online education in higher education.  

India is not just consuming creative content anymore—it is shaping global culture, and AI is its amplifier. This is the new Rasa Yatra—a journey of emotion, technology, expression, and enterprise. Digital and AI-ML are not threats to creative careers. They are the wings. The question is—are you learning to fly?

The author is currently the Director General of Management School of Events, Entrepreneurship and Design (MSEED) in the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan’s campus in Andheri West, Mumbai. He was earlier the Pro Vice Chancellor of Kolkata based Adamas University and Dean of Media and Design in Symbiosis and Amity Universities, Pearl Academy and Whistling Woods International.

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Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury

‘Killed’ by Education

When we were of 10 or 12 or 14 years of age, our parents and teachers almost gloated on our abilities to draw, paint, dance, sing or write a poem, and we were paraded before our relatives to ‘showcase our talent’ or perform on school stage on Annual Days. Do you remember that?

But alas, when we turned 16 till 18, and faced two Board exams of X and XII standards, all these much-touted talent took a back seat. They were dubbed as ‘hobbies’ and declared not to be pursued much as we were to focus on our careers, education that will give high marks and grades, make us logical and rational, and put us on a great professional track as the best managers, engineers, doctors, lawyers or stock-brokers of sorts.

And in no time, even before we could realise, we were adults, into a rat race, and have forgotten that once upon a time we also did sing, dance, draw, write poetry, act, or speak on stages. We were lost in the big bad world, because in a rat race, you remain a rat wherever you are at a point of time.

The world taught us one great lesson: to compete with others and turned us logical, very rational, evolved structured thinking, in effect, turned us what the world believed to be ‘reasonable’. Many a time, we ceased to laugh in abundance, or dance with the wind, or sing when heart wanted, or act funny every now and then, in life and at work. 

Many of us were conditioned to think that anything which is creative, which is right-brain, which is aesthetic or artistic is meant mainly for appreciation, admiration, a tool to break ice with others, for social charm, and only that much and no more. These do not make money, create careers, be valued in the economy. 

The Few Glorious Exceptions:

We heard of some exceptions though. An artist’s piece of art sold at thirty lacs you hear. A singer sang for almost half a crore one night with ten thousand people crooning live. A fiction-writers wrote a story whose film rights went for twenty lacs. And many more. However, still these were not enough for your ‘security’ seeking parents and your ‘marriage-market’ will not consider you having a recipe of ‘success’ ahead just because someone made a fluke fortune with a creative expression.

Times are changing. Now is the time to declare a beautiful, colourful and bold war against all of these which went against your grain if you are an incorrigible creative soul from inside, with no competition with anyone except yourself, dedicated to your own creative work, aware of the technologies that you need to make this work a great one, and conscious of the ways and means to take your work to millions and earn your livelihood with joy and abundance, and for a lifetime. Monetizing your creative content is the crux of the matter though. 

What do you or rather your well-wishers look for? Career Security? Sustainability? Career? Money? Fame? Name? Network? Recognition? You name it and it is there for the taking on the creative path, today. But only for those who would go the full hog to turn their die-hard dogged passion into a marketable sustainable admired profession with saleable content for people’s consumption. Dog is my favourite animal indeed. 

Today the digital revolution is sweeping across the world of creative expressions. There is a whole new world of web-entertainment on internet and through OTTs, mobile and online journalism, reputation and branding online, radio online, et al. In addition, lower entry barriers and lesser legal compliances till date are making content through digital media almost a cottage industry. Yes, the revenue models for all digital media properties are still not in place, which perhaps is a question of time to evolve. 

Create a Bold New World:

Its time now for the artists on canvas or stone or wood or glass to stand up and create a brand of your own through social media, place yourself in the market-place through corporate art, art curating, art gallery, art foundations, media cartoons, restaurant art, or art and literary festivals.

Then there are story-tellers around and they have the best time as story-telling is the most impacting communication today. They need to stand up and choose the preferred medium and audience to tell their stories: whether in audio through podcasts and radio, or in pictures through photo features and creative photography, or visually through computer generated graphical or animated visuals. They can tell their stories audio-visually through short stories, feature films, web series. The stories can be told for-profit and also for not-for-profit organizations through branded content. Tell your story on different platforms and contexts, say on streets, or on stage. Tell it in whispers, tell it in small groups, tell it to many, tell it to all, tell it loud and clear. Tell it in silence, tell it with sound. Tell it in tears or with laughter. But tell it nevertheless, with all your charm and boldness. Also making good money in the process making every consumer of your story pay for it either directly or indirectly through your advertisers. 

A decade ago, no one would have thought that a 400 crores investment in story-telling on celluloid over five years can bring in 3500 crores. Bahubali did. Or that a 90 crores investment can bring in 2200 crores back. Dangal did. Even Marathi and Bengali films have crossed the 100 crores mark by the dozens now, where films rarely crossed 20-30 crores till recently. 

In spite of rosy possibilities, it is also important not to gloss over the fact that one needs to know the right techniques to tell the story effectively, know your right audiences to tell it with the best desired impact, know how to be resourceful in your work without chasing just the mundane. That is, know to tell a story that stands out. Above all, one must know not just how to produce great content, but how to monetize it seamlessly across multiple media. Post pandemic, more particularly, in the digital medium.

Then for the dancers, the singers, the composers, the writers amongst us, there is a world of opportunities knocking on our doors. There are no less than sixteen types of professional writing, for example, that can make money: branded content, screenplay, dialogues, playwriting, copy writing, fiction, non-fiction, journalistic, web-writing, jingle writing, technical writing, and a lot more. If you want to tell what you see, or what you imagine, or what you believe in, or what you observe: you have takers for all, if you can connect to your audience emotionally. 

Today music has a robust career in playback singing, music direction, fusion creation, bands, concerts, music management, online music, and many more. So do the dancers dancing in troupes and films, for functions and weddings, running schools and events, managing operas and dance directing. 

Media & Entertainment: Three Pathways:

Media and communication domain has three broad pathways: journalism, entertainment and brand communication, and then several specialization areas within each of these. While the specialized skills and knowledge are always a must, one must begin from a broad-base of understanding the entire gamut of communication, its technology and its business, before specializing in one segment. A doctor studies entire human anatomy and physiology before specializing in any one aspect and become a paediatrician or orthopaedic or gynaecologist etc. In communication too, one must first be a communicator and then a journalist or film-maker or adman or a public relations professional, etc.  

Story-telling Gets Tech-savvy:

Those among you who are creative geeks with penchant for technology more than others: you have a longer path of fun and success ahead. Now is a world of fantasy visualized into animated images, characters and stories, or into engaging games and play-stations. The stories you observed or thought of all your life, with some suggestions of your sample audiences, can be evolved into video games that engage them. Over the last one decade, the virtual reality (creating the make-belief world which is not in front physically) and augmented reality (extending the physical reality to a larger canvas) are storming the creative space. They are breaking all frontiers of imaginative story-telling, with assistance of mixed reality as well.

Today world of fashion is closer to communication than ever before. There are weaving stories on fabrics, blending nature and culture with apparel, and creating styles and fashion which are simply elegant or stunning. 

We find all other forms of creative and communicative careers as well now: building images, managing crises, creating brand expressions, creating behavioural changes, creating brand trust, weaving identities or reputation of people, places and organizations, et al.

Yes, these are exciting times. This is indeed your big time to call the shots. But there is a health-check. An average half-hearted initiative will not give any outcome. It must have all your focus or none at all. You have to put the best foot forward or show no limb. The media domain needs ideas, concepts, practices, technologies and business sense all rolled into one great outcome that attracts attention and sell well. 

To get this knowledge right, choose your creative education space wisely, so that you walk out with a portfolio that can command a price, and acquiring technical skills that will hold you for long in the market-place of talent. Your learning space must be intricately industry-connected, and strong in technical infra-structure and intellectual capital. 

Digital Media & Skills Needed

Even before the pandemic, the small handheld screen was taking the bigger tele-screen by the horns. The any-time consumption of video online is increasing fast, from news to entertainment, short video to music video, aided by the low internet costs on handsets. The digital expansion is being reborn almost every day with 1500 million cell phone users in South Asia, more than half of them being active on internet and social media with smart-phones. Pandemic has ensured that 8 on 10 internet users are now a regular daily user. The ever-expanding transition to the digital world ahead will be aided by Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality ad Virtual Reality, which will add visual and conceptual diversity. The phenomenon is already on, and will increase in intensity. 

Bon Voyage in your creative journey.

The author is the Director General of Management School of Events, Entertainment and Design (MSEED)

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By Prof. Ujjwal Anu Chowdhury

His last LinkedIn profile notes him as ‘Professor of Practice, Student and Strategic Adviser.’ But the media fraternity and corporate houses of India knew him as a persistent marketeer and ideator who rose from a management trainee in 1980 to President, Response, in the Times of India group. And then, in the later part of his career, he became Group CEO with the Zee Group, Executive President with the Republic Media, and, if I am not wrong, at a similar leadership role in Dainik Bhaskar group. To the marketing professionals, he is also remembered as the longest running President of Ad Club of Mumbai and an avid organizer of premier advertising and marketing events of the city. 

Such a colourful and accomplished person is known differently by different people, and seen differently by different people, depending upon the relation one had with him. Everyone will have their piece of story and perspective of interaction with him. 

He was Dr Bhaskar Das to all.

To me he was Bhaskarda, a quintessential Bengali elder brother and mentor, and perhaps will always remain so in my mind. For me, he was one who on the Advisory Board of every media school in town that I had led, whether the Symbiosis media school, Whistling Woods School of Communication, ISBM, Pearl Media School, Amity University Mumbai, and Adamas University Media Faculty, and even the relatively smaller DGMC Media School. His one line of encouragement, “I love education, and you are doing an admirable work, and I shall be on every place you invite, if it adds value.”

Not just being on the advisory board, he meticulously went through long notes of syllabi of communication courses, made copious notes, and actively participated in the advisory body meetings. He had his unique positions on issues related to technological convergence with perspectives divergence, on how brands are alive and kicking and yet traditional branding is long dead, or on volatility coupled with stability of our times. He was respectful to minority views in every meeting, delightful with his quips and little nuggets of humour with the lady members in any meeting that I know of, and very punctual in his timings.

I am personally thankful that he found time to attend jury board meetings for selecting the best performing media schools on different counts, during Edutainment Awards jury meetings; or looking at the communication initiatives of corporate brands during PRSI Kolkata Awards jury meeting. He once said, “You learn the best when you judge the best out of many good and some not so good work. You learn what to do more and better, and what never to do again.”

Quintessentially a print media man from the last century, he rewired himself for the television first and the digital later. And agreed that this march ahead had challenged many of his insights and beliefs, and he was open to be proven wrong again and again to learn the next best thing in the evolving world of communication. Mentored originally by the legendary media marketing mastermind, Pradip Guha, Bhaskarda himself gradually became the mentor of dozens younger to him. 

This quest for more, desire to learn the next best thing happening around, led him to take up successfully his first doctoral research from Pune University on media management, which he finished in 2009. In ten years he was restless for more structured learning that led him to his second PhD from the JIS University, of Kolkata, and this was on incorporating social listening into integrated marketing communication mix, which was an exploratory study, by 2020. And in five years, he found himself wanting in deep dive knowledge again with the digital scenario unfolding big time, and he started his third PhD from the GLS University of Gujarat, on the theme, information consumption and life choices, a study of Gen Z of India. These were not degrees for him, but excuses to pursue a sort of deep dive learning in one given area. 

He also actively participated in the Mudra Institute (MICA) Governing Council meetings and contributed as a Professor of Practice there too, which the former MICA professor and acting Dean, Dr Arbind Sinha fondly remembers.

His one of the pet quests was to find the happiness quotient of the newer generation and their inspiration sources, and how these findings can be integrated in communication messaging. These searches he was integrating into his third doctoral thesis which would have been submitted this year. We can, hence, say that he remained a learner, a practitioner, and a strategist till the last date. In fact, though with a cancer attack for quite some time, he was neither silent nor inactive and continued with his research, consultation and voluntary support to various organizations even remotely. 

I lost my senior from the Department of International Relations, Jadavpur University. I lost a Dada who guided and advised me on many counts specially with regards to communication education. I lost an inspiring professional who was in his third PhD in spite of being President of at least three of India’s top media organizations and mentor to many communication startups. One life, many avatars.

Rest in Peace, Bhaskarda!

Prof Ujjwal Anu Chowdhury

Exit polls for the results of Indian general elections 2024 of the mainstream leading television channels and survey agencies are as follows:

India Today- Axis My India -361-401 

News 24-Today's Chanakya -400 

ABP News-C Voter - 353-383 

Republic Bharat- P Marq -359 

India News- D-Dyanamics -371 

Republic Bharat- Matrize- 353-368 

Dainik Bhaskar- 281-350 

News Nation -342-378 

TV 9 Bharatvarsh- Polstrat -342 

Times Now-ETG - 358 

India TV- CNX -362-392 

Jan Ki Baat - 362-392

#ExitPollPlus

These are seats given to BJP led NDA all of which are much above the requisite 272 to form the government at the centre.

There is one lone voice of difference with a completely alternative numbers as follows:

DB Live-Elect Lime Figures (Desh Bandhu Live: popular YouTube Channel):

INDIA: 260-295; NDA: 215-245; Others: 28-48

Just this exit poll predicts a win for Congress led INDIA and BJP led NDA much below 272. And I stand with this prediction, albeit with some strong reasons of arithmetic of numbers, chemistry among alliance partners (specially in the opposition) and spirit on the ground. 

Firstly, there is no overarching issue like the India Against Corruption movement and Achhey Din promise as in 2014 or Pulwama attack and the much-touted surgical strikes as in 2019. Even in spite of Pulwama and aggressive nationalism in public mind, NDA managed to get 353 seats (with 303 of BJP alone). On what basis then will NDA get above that number as predicted by most? While except Modi image there is no overarching reason for the ruling NDA in this election, the Opposition had caste-based census, legally binding Minimum Support Price of crops to farmers, among others as their common issues. In contrast, the talks on Mangalsutra, Congress to take away your buffaloes, Muslims as infiltrators, Modi being divine, or the world did not know Mahatma Gandhi before Richard Attenborough’s film on him: all of these by Modi himself actually brought down his image and sheen sharply. 

Also to be noted here is that in exit polls, the agencies actually calculate vote percentages and they translate those into seats. But in real life, percentages do not automatically translate into seats. Just 37% of BJP votes nationally in 2019 gave them 303 seats, while even 20% of votes for Congress could manage to give them only 52 seats. More stark differences are seen in the states. Lower percentage of votes in a very concentrated manner in some pockets can always give more seats and hence the local parties stand to gain with concentrated vote-share more than the national parties. 

Secondly, BJP in 2019 had 37.7% vote-share, and with allies it went up to 42%.  Congress had 19.66%, Samajwadi Party: 2.55%, Trinamool Congress: 4.1%, AAP: 0.9%, DMK: 2.3%, RJD: 2.1%. They are all in INDIA alliance, apart from the original segments of NCP and Shiv Sena, and also the Left, all together had close to 4.5%. The total of these is around 38%. Finally, even with a sweeping issue like the Pulwama, the vote share of the two alliances were 42% against 38%. Several NDA alliance partners have left (like Akalis), many have got divided (like Shiv Sena), and many partners have joined erstwhile Congress led UPA to become INDIA alliance of today. There was not even a semblance of a united fight by the opposition in 2019, while this time in 2024, a resolute and united opposition fought in all major states of India. 

Third, all the by-elections to Maharashtra Assembly that have happened after the break of Shiv Sena and NCP have been won by those opposed to NDA. The Mumbai electoral mood is so much against Eknath Shinde led break-away section and BJP for forcing the Uddhav Thackeray government to resign, that till this day, BMC does not have its elected body for more than two years and 24 municipalities in the state are without any elected representatives. The anger in Maharashtra is palpable, and the exit polls showing 75% seats to NDA is far beyond reality. 

Fourth, with the coming together of AAP and Congress in Delhi and their workers organizing joint meetings with fervor, and the fact that BJP had to change 6 out of 7 of its candidates there, coupled with election-time jailing of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, the mood in Delhi is quite different this time from that of 2019. Giving 7 out of 7 seats of BJP by exit polls is far-fetched. 

Fifth, the farmers’ movements for withdrawal of 3 farm bills and for MSP, that erupted after 2019, have seen more than 700 die, thousands arrested, and people in Haryana, Punjab and Western UP by and largely disillusioned with the ruling dispensation. AAP sweeping the Punjab assembly polls and winning in Chandigarh municipality are some evidences of this disillusionment. Exit polls are showing BJP sweep in Western UP and Haryana, and a reasonably good show in Punjab. Highly improbable. 

Sixth, BJP performed very well in West Bengal in 2019, winning in 18 constituencies, coming close second after TMC with 22. That led to their call for more than 200 seats in Bengal Assembly polls in 2021, which actually came out to be 77, of which many have resigned since then and loads of workers coming back to TMC. All by-elections and panchayat elections since then show that TMC has maintained its vote share and winning spree, and BJP declining, while the Left showing good revival. In 2019, it was actually 12% of Left vote that had gone to BJP as it was seen as a rising force against TMC. Now, in 2024, the Left-Congress combine as gone out full hog to muster up as much as anti-TMC votes as possible. In no way there shall be an anti-TMC consolidation behind BJP this time in Bengal, and Left-Congress combine will do well and will divide this anti-Mamata electorates. Hence, TMC seats reducing is a complete illogical thing in Bengal, and is not seen as well on ground. 

Seventh, exit polls give out of the way high seats to BJP in Kerala (where BJP has never won one nor come close), Tamil Nadu (where BJP has not won any in 2019), Telengana (where recently Congress state government has come to power with a strong majority), and in Karnataka (where recently BJP had a thrashing defeat with less than half Assembly seats than those of Congress). The BJP seats in these states look much bloated than reality on ground. It is only in Andhra Pradesh that NDA alliance is doing well due to an expected good show of Telegu Desam Party. 

Eighth, exit polls are giving higher seats to BJP in Orissa than the ruling popular Biju Janata Dal there, and is giving sweeping seats in Bihar (where JDU, a BJP partner, has lost credibility due to multiple flip-flops, and Tejaswi led Rashtriya Janata Dal has been doing an intense campaign with more than 200 rallies in the last two months). 

Ninth, even the rest of the Hindi belt is not there where it was in 2019. The defeat of Congress in Rajasthan assembly was narrow, in Chattisgarh was also a close one, and only in MP the results were astonishingly totally against Congress. In UP too, the united electoral battle of Samajwadi Party and Congress has been showing immense potential in the last two months. Four times their rallies had to be cancelled due to much larger audiences than the available space. The differences between Modi-Shah and Yogi Adityanath are all very well known, and Yogi was muted this time in campaign. To predict a total sweep of BJP in these four states today is a completely naïve assessment. 

Finally, all are not quiet for BJP even in their original Hindutva lab, Guajarat, where Rajputs have pledged openly in hundreds of villages to vote against BJP (local reasons of an insult to Rajputs by a state BJP minister), and similarly large number of tribals had also decided to vote for INDIA alliance partners, Congress and AAP.

With joblessness hitting half a century high, inflation being on a continuous high range since the pandemic, fuel price hike and rupee price free fall being there for the entire tenure of last five years of this government, no income tax relief to middle class, no real One Rank One Pension scheme or Old Pension scheme given to government employees, the middle class in urban India is no more in the adulatory mood as in 2019 in the backdrop of Pulwama attack. 

Arithmetic of numbers (seats, percentage of votes, share of allies’ performances), chemistry among allies, spirit on ground: nothing shows a total sweep of NDA (unless of course if the elections or the counting are rigged or at least compromised in selected seats). 

The author is a university professor of media and communication studies. 

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Brief Life-sketch: Prof.Ujjwal K Chowdhury

Date of Birth: 3^rd of November, 1965.

Current Engagement:

Pro Vice Chancellor (Branding, International Relations, Corporate Relations, CSR)

& Dean, School of Media, Communication & Fashion
Adamas University, Kolkata

Regular writer on education, media, society and politics in DNA, Deccan Herald, Deccan Chronicle, Millennium Post, Eastern Chronicle, Financial Chronicle, Newslaundry, The Policy Times, The Tribune, Assam Tribune, Sunday Guardian, The Wire, Gomantak Times, IndiaReal.in etc.

Regularly appearing on India Ahead TV and irregularly in Network 18 News. 

Immediate Last  Engagement: Education & Media/Communication Assignments & Consulting.

Last: Dean, School of Media, Pearl Academy, Delhi & Mumbai (a Global University Systems, London Group institute).

Previous: Head, Education Division, Ramoji Krian group, Ramoji Film City, Hyderabad, working as Director, Ramoji Krian Universe.

Awards and Recognition:

1. Winner of Global Leadership in Communication Education in 2015, awarded by Sharjah and Kerala Chambers of Commerce in Dubai.
2. Winner of Hall of Fame in Communication Education in 2011, awarded by Public Relations Council of India (PRCI).
3. Winner of Golden Triangle Award of Global Forum for Public Relations (GFPR) in ‘12.

Earlier Engagements: 

1. Editorial Director, www.MediaDesignEdu.com & The Edutainment Show (Mumbai): work involving the editing of www.MediaDesignEdu.com and leading the series of Edutainment Events focused on media and design education in several cities annually. 
2. Senior Academic Consultant, Amsterdam Film School (to be renamed soon as Amsterdam International Media School), from August 1, 2015 (visiting six times a year). Assignment till July, 2016.Task to make all course outlines and detailed syllabi of courses other than films (new media courses) and take special talks.
3. Dean, Faculty of Media, Design & Communication, Amity University, Mumbai from Feb 1, 2015. Engaged in developing Amity University Mumbai as a part of the leading team on ground here, including media and design faculty systems, processes, infra-structure, academic programs, relationships with industry and voluntary organizations.
4. Dean, DGMC (Deviprasad Goenka Media College), Mumbai University (June 2014-January 2015): Engaged in building academic, branding and administrative SOPs, marketing communications strategy and plan of action, recruiting additional staff, and creating new high-end studio, shooting floor and preview theatre on campus. The new marketing strategy for 2015 admissions here is based on convergence of offline, online and on-ground communication (a strategic series of ads in three newspapers that target our audience, a major online campaign through 4 social media platforms and selected educational portals apart from re-launch of the college portal, and launching two event properties: Mumbai Media Champs focused on admission branding, and #Hashtag: the Digital Fest focused on industry/placements branding.
5. 2013-2014: Nepal Work: Has been consultant to CG Group (launch of the college: CG Insitute of Management, SOPs etc), ICA college (branding), King’s College (re-branding and Quality Policy), NBA Publications (re-launch, re-design of some of its initiatives and setting up the events division) and Himalaya TV (events and contents planning) in the past for a total of 18 months in 2013-14.
6. Dean, Whistling Woods International School of Communication, Film City, Mumbai (2011-2013): launched the School of Communication (WWI Film School was there already) with more than expected number of students, with operational break-even in the first year itself. Also, created WWI-SMC brand through 10-city Seminar Series named Inspiration Meets, involving students, and also creating a strong online brand of the institute. Creating a powerful 22 member Advisory Board of senior media professionals. Placing one batch. WWW-SMC has recently got the best emerging media school of India award.
7. Executive Director, ISB&M School of Communication (2010-2011)

International School of Business and Media, Pune, Kolkata, and NOIDA campuses: Creating campuses in Kolkata and Noida for media within ISB&M (Only Pune was there earlier). Branding through Media Mindprints events across 12 cities. Strong editorial writing on the institute done. Creating the entire course outlined and detailed syllabus, and recruiting faculty for the same. Placing two batches in quick succession. ISBM Communication school got the best advertising course award in 2011.

(H) Dean of the Symbiosis International University, and (1998-2001; 2006-2010) Director of Symbiosis Institute of Media & Communication, Pune and Bengaluru campuses: Almost legendary branding done within six years of engagement in Symbiosis, with 20 cities events series named SIMC Footprints focused on all areas of media and communication learning. Industry footfall in Pune campus through annual events like Fest-o-Comm, National Radio Meet, National Cyber Media Conference, South Asian Youth Peace Meet. And ensuring double internship and final placements of several batches going upto 240 PG and 120 UG students in a single year. SIMC PG is currently the third ranked best media school of India and SIMC PG is the number one under-graduate media school of India. Also, launched the SIMC PG Bengaluru campus as well during 2009-10.

Past jobs:

Media Adviser, The Nippon Foundation (Goodwill Ambassador, WHO), Delhi & Geneva: 2005: focusing more on creating messaging, media platforms, events and mainstream media PR for the WHO fight against eradication of Leprosy with Nippon Foundation President Yohei Sasakawa as the WHO Goodwill Ambassador in this Mission.

Media Adviser, Textiles Ministry, Government of India, Delhi: 2003-04: focusing on creating brand of Indian Textiles and quality mark, and positive PR for government initiatives in this context.

Worked with Business India Group, Zee Group, Observer group, Blitz, et al: 1991-1997: editorial engagements in various capacities.

Educational qualifications:

Pursuing PhD Doctoral Thesis on Media Convergence in Pt Deendayal University (PDPU, Gujarat); Masters in International Relations, Jadavpur University;

PG Diploma in Journalism and Communication, 9^th in all India CBSE Exams in 1981 (Class X)

Leadership work:

1. School Monitor, Ramkrishna Mission School, Along, Arunachal Pradesh
2. Cultural Secretary, Jadavpur University Arts Faculty, Kolkata
3. Leading role in seminars and debates across educational life
4. Leadership of ICONS Media Consultancy, Delhi
5. Managing Trustee, Generation Next Charitable Trust, Pune
6. Addressed a session of UN Human Rights Commission, Geneva, on issues connected to human rights violations of people affected by leprosy even after their cure
7. Addressed a session on WHO on social stigma connected to communicable diseases
8. Addressed youth in 26 cities of India in 2003-04 on India: Vision 2020.
9. Times of India Lead India Contest: Pune City Finalist.

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NOIDA : Day-3 of the International Conference ICAN3 organized by DME Media School upped the ante when renowned media academician Prof. Ujjwal K Chowdhury, Pro Vice-Chancellor, School of Media, Communication & Fashion, Adamas University, Kolkata, West Bengal took a plenary session on the pertinent topic ‘COVID impact on Media and Entertainment’ on June 23, 2020. The session started with the opening remarks by Dr Ambrish Saxena, Dean, DME Media School and Organising Secretary of ICAN3 and Dr Susmita Bala, Head, DME Media School and Convenor of ICAN3 welcoming the guest.

Prof. Chawdhury with his mammoth experience in the field of industry unfolded the changing aspects of the media and entertainment industry due to the COVID pandemic. Prof. Chawdhury said, “Digital convergence is the way forward and adaptation of new techniques and switching to the digital platform will bridge the gap created by the pandemic”.

Dr Ambrish Saxena added to the conversation by emphasising on the importance of evolution and coping up with the current loses in a good spirit to trudge forward to the better future in the industry.

During the same session, the special editions of Newsletter of DME Media School were unveiled digitally through an AV prepared by Mr Sumantra Sarathi Das, Assistant Professor. The newsletter is focused on the COVID-19 pandemic and all the content is specially generated by the faculty of DME and renowned experts from the field of journalism.

The enlightening plenary session with Prof. Chawdhury was followed by a Master class focusing on ‘India’s Misplaced Priorities: Community, Media and Policy.’ The first Master class of the conference was conducted by Mr Akram Hoque, Founder Editor, The Policy Times, New Delhi.

The session detailed about India’s decision making policies and elaborated on how a good decision is to be made by a policymaker or a government official. Mr Hoque said, “Community, Media and Policy can be our strengths and weaknesses”. He illuminated the hidden parts of India’s decision-making policies and stressed the dual nature of the community and media.

With concrete research to back-up his claim, Mr Akram, detailed out the positive changes India can implement to exterminate faults in policies such as job creation and our healthcare system among others which have been increased due to the Corona Virus pandemic.

While Mr Mohit Kishore Vatsa, Assistant Professor, moderated the master-class, Muskan Bakshi, a first-year BJMC student anchored the session.

Day3 of the conference ended with a technical session in which several papers were presented on the theme ‘Media Content, News Analysis and Ethical Issues’. Discussion on Fake News, Propaganda and Misinformation was the highlight of the session. It was chaired by Dr Anubhuti Yadav, Professor and Course Director, Advertising and Public Relations, Indian Institute of Mass Communication, New Delhi and co-chaired by Ms Yashasvika Yadav, Assistant Professor. Kumar Kanish, a student, was the anchor of the session.

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