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Partylines

There are seven national political parties in India and four electoral alliances. There are some 40 regional parties which have a more or less strong footing in India’s states.

The National Parties:

The Indian National Congress (INC), originated as an independence movement when India was under British rule. Founded in 1885, it became a major political party after independence and its leader JL Nehru was elected as the first Prime Minister in 1952. In 1967, the Congress, split into two parties. The faction that was led by Nehru’s daughter, Indira Gandhi, was recognised as the INC. She was assassinated in 1984 and her son Rajiv took over.

He was assassinated in 1991, during the election campaign which the Congress was hoping would take it back to power after being defeated in the 1989 general election. Narasimha Rao took the reins of the party.

Today it is Rajiv's widow, Sonia Gandhi, who is party president. She turned down offers to become Prime Minister, for fear of criticism of her Italian origins. Since 2004, Manmohan Singh has been Congress Prime Minister.

The future leader of the Congress Party could be Rahul Gandhi, son of Rajiv and Sonia, grandson of Indira, and great-grandson of Jawaharlal Nehru.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which means the Indian people’s party, was born out of the Bharatiya Jan Sangh (BJS), which became part of the Janata Dal coalition which won the 1977 general election, after the end of the Congress-imposed state of emergency.

The BJP split from the Janata Party in 1980 after the government collapsed the year before. Its first leader was Atal Bihari Vajpayee who led the Indian government as Prime Minister in 1996 for 13 days, and in 1998.

The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPIM), CPIM came about after a rift in the Communist Party of India (CPI) in 1964. The CPIM leads the Left Front Alliance. It is the third largest political party in India. One of the seven national parties, the Left Front Alliance governs the states of West Bengal, Tripura and Kerala. 

  The Communist Party of India (CPI) It is one of the older parties in India, founded under British rule, in 1925. The CPI has joined with other left-wing parties in the Left Front Alliance.

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), the Majority People's Party, says its stand for the "social transformation and economic emacipation" of the dalits (scheduled castes) and other social or religious minority groups. It was founded in 1984 as a state party and its president, Mayawati Kumari, is currently Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh (UP), one of India's most densely populated states .

The other national parties are the Nationalist Congress Party and the Rashtriya Janata Dal.