In Bihar's 2015 state assembly elections, a coalition pairing Lalu Prasad Yadav's Rashtriya Janata Dal with Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal (U) swept a broad majority of constituencies, handing the two-party bloc a decisive outcome at the polls. The open camaraderie the two leaders displayed on the campaign trail drew Yadav and Kurmi voters into a shared electoral fold, contributing to the outcome.
The two leaders had shared a number of platforms, putting their rekindled political alliance on open display before crowds. The alliance drew together voter constituencies that had long been regarded as politically and socially at odds with each other, while demonstrating the organisational experience Nitish Kumar had accumulated over years alongside the drive and momentum that Tejashwi Yadav brought to the campaign. The presence of Congress in the alliance helped consolidate opposition votes that might otherwise have fractured across rival parties.
Formalised in June 2015, the alliance moved through ticket-sharing arrangements by August of that year before polling dates were set for the October–November window. Rank-and-file members backed the resolution, though unease among them had not fully subsided.
Uttar Pradesh is scheduled to hold its next assembly elections sometime in the February–March 2027 window. The NDA's position in the state looks settled for now, whereas the INDIA bloc — led by the Samajwadi Party and Congress — is preparing to field a combined front against the BJP, though internal coordination within that grouping remains a work in progress.
No formal declaration of an alliance between the two parties has come from their respective leaderships. Akhilesh Yadav has stated his position plainly, whereas the Congress party has kept its stance less defined. Rapport built between Akhilesh and Rahul Gandhi at the leadership level had not yet translated into coordinated messaging among mid-tier figures from either party, where mixed signals continued to surface.
The latest organisational shake-up within the party apparatus — which placed AICC general secretary Rajendra Pal Gautam, UPCC president Aradhana Mishra, and state working president Imran Masood into their respective leadership posts — has drawn analysis from observers who see it as an attempt to broaden electoral appeal across communities that have historically formed part of the party's support base.
Remarks from both Gautam — a politician whose affiliations have spanned the BSP, the AAP, and the Congress — and Imran Masood, who has not set aside his grievance over being denied a ticket by Akhilesh Yadav in the 2022 assembly elections, have left political watchers uncertain about whether the two are angling for a larger seat share from the SP or attempting to destabilise the alliance entirely. On matters of seat allocation, Mishra defers to the party hierarchy rather than staking out positions that could inflame tensions.
Voters from that faith group are broadly reported to favour an electoral alliance between Congress and the SP. AIMIM, led by Asaduddin Owaisi, remains an available electoral route for voters, though the party would likely rank behind other choices should it enter the contest without coalition backing.
Some voters from the Brahmin community are weighing the Congress party as a viable electoral choice. Tensions between the group and the BJP have built around several points of contention, with the UGC equity regulations standing out among the disputes driving that rift. A voting shift did occur in 2007, when backing went to the BSP in spite of the party's slogans directed against upper-caste communities. Party leader SC Mishra's groundwork among villages where Brahmin residents form a majority gave the BSP a foothold that Congress has yet to establish through comparable outreach of its own.
Two seats in the legislature went to the party, which drew 2.50 per cent of the overall vote. Questions of relevance have continued to dog the party, with its standing in the state still unresolved in the minds of many voters.
Analysts attributed the Dalit vote toward the INDIA bloc in the 2024 general elections to a combination of factors: Mayawati's reduced political activity, widespread concern among Dalit voters that a BJP victory could threaten constitutional protections, and the bloc's availability as a voting option — even though the Samajwadi Party was not the preferred choice among Jatav voters. Members of the Pasi community had directed their electoral support toward the SP in previous voting cycles. Conditions in that area have shifted from what they were at that earlier point. Both the BSP and the Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) — whose parliamentary face is Nagina MP Chandrashekhar Azad — have maintained a presence in the contest.
Absent from power in Uttar Pradesh for many years, the Congress party has nonetheless approached each election cycle with expectations of a reversal in its political standing. Crowd sizes at Rahul Gandhi's rallies have been on an upward trajectory, yet whether that on-the-ground energy is converting into votes at the polling booth is not yet clear.
Of the contests the party entered across Bihar that year, roughly one in every 40 returned a win. Of the 61 constituencies it entered, only six returned a victory. Uttar Pradesh party figures below the top tier have put forward seat allocation demands in the range of 150 to 200 constituencies, a figure that stands in contrast to the party's actual tally of 2 seats out of 403 contested in the 2022 state assembly elections.
The party's position draws on its 2024 general election results — a vote share of 9.53% and six seats captured from the 17 it put forward — alongside the view that the SP drew electoral advantage from the alliance arrangement and translated that into 37 seats of its own. Seat-sharing choices, Akhilesh Yadav indicated, would rest on a candidate's ability to win rather than on the arithmetic of numbers alone.
The Samajwadi Party has organised PDA Yatras to draw attention to what it describes as irregularities in the voting process, a move that has placed the administration of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath under scrutiny. Observers who track electoral trends have pointed out that an SP-Congress tie-up could pose a genuine contest to the BJP, provided the two parties maintain their coalition, deliver voters a coherent joint platform, and run their campaign operations in tandem across the state.
Several structural and electoral factors continue to work in the BJP's favour. Despite internal party divisions, Adityanath's profile as the organisation's leading public face has remained broadly stable, though unresolved allegations — ranging from reported irregularities in Ram temple donation funds and the conduct of demolition drives to accusations of corruption and Rajput favouritism in village-level governance — continue to draw scrutiny. The messaging he has built around religious and cultural identity is reported to resonate with a loyal base of supporters. Women form part of his electoral base, pointing to improvements in public safety across the state as a reason for their backing.
Among the demographic groups paying attention to the electoral contest, younger voters appear drawn to Rahul Gandhi's 'Chhatron ki Goonj' initiative, Akhilesh Yadav's forward-looking platform, and the outreach efforts of the Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram).
