Political Parties

Study handouts
By Dipen Thapa

What is a Political Party?

A political party is a group of people who come together to contest elections and hold power in the
government. Different parties can have different views on what is good for the people, these parties try to
persuade people why their policies are better than others. They seek to implement these policies by
winning popular support through elections. A political party has three Components:
I. The leaders,
II. The active members and
III. The followers

Functions of Political Parties

● Elections: Parties contest elections. In most democracies, elections are contested mainly among
the candidates put up by political parties.
● Declaration of Policies: There are always some socio-economic and political issues before the
nation at the domestic and international levels. Political parties put forward their considered views
and policies before the people and suggest ways to tackle the issues.
● Moulding Public Opinion: The parties stimulate interest of public in the issues before the nation.
They use all means of mass communication to educate, influence and mould public opinion in their
favour. Political parties are significant agencies for creating public opinion.
● To form and run the Government: Formation of government is one of the aims and functions of
a political party. In a Parliamentary system, the leader of the party in power becomes the Prime
Minister and he appoints the other ministers in his Cabinet.
● Function of Criticism: The party or parties, which fail to form the government, constitute the
opposition and perform the most important function of criticising the working of government, its
policies and its failures. They check the government from assuming dictatorial powers.

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Party Systems
Based on the practice across the world, currently, we have three types of the party system:
● One Party System: In this type of system, only one party can contest elections and form
government. One common feature of a one-party state is that the position of the ruling party is
guaranteed in a constitution and all forms of political opposition are banned by law. The ruling
party controls all aspects of life within that state. This type of system does not offer choice to
people and hence is not good for democracy. For example China, North Korea, Iraq etc.
● Two-Party System: In this type, the competition for power is largely between two major parties
only. Although several small parties exist but these parties have no political importance. Therefore,
the competition is between two major parties only. For example, the United States of America and
the United Kingdom.
● Multi-party System: In this system, more than two parties compete for power in elections and
each has a reasonable chance of winning a majority to form the government. In this system, people
have a variety of choices to choose candidates from different parties for their state as well as for
the country. In a multi-party system there is also always a chance of coalition governments in
which two or more parties comes together to form government in case no party gets majority on its
own. Some examples of Multi-party systems are India, France, Germany etc.

Types of Political Parties

● Democracies that follow the federal system have generally two types of parties. The first type
includes those parties whose presence is limited to only two federal units or states; they are called
State parties. The second type includes those parties whose presence is across most of the states
and plays an important role in the formation of central government; they are referred to as
National parties.
● Every party has to be registered with the Election Commission of India. While the Election
Commission treats every party, equally it provides some special facilities to large parties such as
providing them with a unique symbol that can be used by the candidates of that party for
contesting elections.
● The Election Commission recognizes such parties, which get some privileges and symbols and
hence are referred to as Recognized Political Parties.

National Parties
● National parties are countrywide parties, which have their units in various states. However, by and
large, all these units follow the same policies, programmes and strategy that is decided at the
national level. A party that secures at least 6% of the total votes in Lok Sabha elections or
Assembly elections in 4 States and wins at least 4 seats in the Lok Sabha is recognised as a
National Party.
● There were 8 national parties in the country before 2023. For example, All India Trinamool
Congress (AITC), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Communist Party of
India (CPI), Communist Party of India - Marxist (CPI-M), Indian National Congress (INC),
Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and National Peoples Party (NPP).
● However, as per latest publications dated May 2023 from Election Commission of India, and
subsequent notifications, there are 6 national parties.
● On 10th April 2023, the Election Commission of India (ECI) revoked the national party status of
three former national parties- the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC), the Nationalist Congress
Party (NCP), and the Communist Party of India (CPI). Subsequently, the ECI recognised Arvind
Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as a national party.

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State Parties
● The Election Commission has classified some of the major parties of the country as State parties.
● These parties should secure at least 6% of the total votes in an election to the Legislative Assembly
of a State and win at least 2 seats to be recognised as a State Party.
● Some of these parties are Biju Janata Dal, Sikkim Krantikari Morcha, Sikkim Democratic Front,
Mizo National Front, Telangana Rashtra Samith etc.

The list of National Parties of India:

1. Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)
2. Indian National Congress (INC)
3. Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP)
4. Communist Party of India -Marxist (CPI-M)
5. National People's Party (NPP)
6. Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was founded in 1980. It originated from Bharatiya Jana
Sangh that was formed in 1951 by Syama Prasad Mookerjee. After the emergency of I977, the Bharatiya
Jana Sangh was merged with other parties to form the Janata Party. It remained in power for three years
thereafter the Janata Party was dissolved in 1980 to create the BJP with the members of erstwhile Jana
Sangh party.

Indian National Congress was founded in 1885 with the support and guidance of Allan
Octavian Hume, a British civil servant. It is the oldest and first national party in India that was formed
even before India got independence. After India became a free country in 1947, the British Govt. handed
over the administration of India to Indian National Congress's leaders. Its first session was held in
Bombay in 1885 with 72 delegates.

Bahujan Samaj Party, which is also known as the BSP, was founded by Kanshi
Ram in 1984 who was a member of the Dalit community. Kanshi Ram was inspired by the ideology and
teachings of B.R. Ambedkar. In 1993, Mayawati succeeded Kanshi Ram and became BSP's president.
Mayawati became the chief minister of UP four times before losing the seat to Samajwadi party in 2012.

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 Communist Party of India (Marxist) is a national party in India. It was founded in
1964. The founding members of CPI (M) include M.N. Roy, Evelyn Trent Roy, Abani Mukherjee,
Mohammad Siddiqui and Mohammad Ali. It is popularly known as CPIM. It is formed when a group of
members of the Communist Party of India (CPI) left the CPI to form CPIM. It is a left-wing political
party that follows communist political ideology as well as is inspired by the writings of Marx and Lenin
and supports and promotes social justice, classless society, and social equality. The mass base of the party
comes mainly from Tripura, West Bengal and Kerala.

National People's Party is a national political party in India. However, it has a strong
presence mainly in the state of Meghalaya. It was founded by P A Sangma in 2013 after he was expelled
from the NCP in 2012. It was accorded the status of a national party on 07 June 2019 after it was
recognized as a state party in the states of Manipur, Nagaland, Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh. It is
also the first party from North-eastern India that became a national political party.

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was founded in November 2012 by Arvind Kejriwal
and his then-companions, following the 2011 Indian anti-corruption movement. AAP is currently the
ruling party of two states: Delhi , and the state of Punjab. The AAP is a state party in both Delhi and
Punjab where it is in power, and it won two seats and a 6.3 per cent vote share in Goa elections in
February 2022. With 12.9 per cent of the votes in Gujarat elections in December 2022, as well as five
seats, it qualified as a national party.